Disclosure: I am writing this with permission and by the request of Ken Hackathorn.
I spent the day at Mr. Hackathorn’s ranch yesterday. During conversation, we began speaking about the Tavor. Of corse Ken gets up, walks away and comes back with his Tavor. His Tavor was equipped with an Aimpoint Micro H-1, a Surefire M600 scout light, a padded VCAS sling and a Daniel Defense forward grip. Ken handed me the rifle and quickly showed me how to operate it. The controls were in OKAY locations and the safety reminded me of a 90 degree SCAR safety. The trigger was heavy but crisp. Ken told me that he had removed one of the trigger springs and it brought the pull from 12# to about 8#.
We ran drills on his range for about 4 hours. There were a few of his friends from the area and another friend of his from back East. We did mostly pistol work but during some of the carbine drills, Ken used the Tavor. Ken was using about 4 magazines. One was the magazine that came with the rifle (Pmag copy), an old Lancer L5 and two GI metal mags. I would guess that during the 5 or 6 carbine drills we did, the Tavor had some kind of stoppage 3 times. I know that he grounded the two GI mags after they didn’t work in one of the carbines his friend was using but I did not keep track of what mags he was using during the stoppages. All of the stoppages with any AR yesterday were magazine realted.
After we ended the day and cleaned the range up a bit, I loaded 25 rounds in the supplied Israli mag and 20 rounds in the lancer L5 mag. I started off with the Lancer mag and shot a 20 round group at 25 yards. My goal was combat accuracy at a decent speed to determine if I could feel the bolt lock back on empty. The Tavor did not malfunction at all during these 20 rounds and I did feel the bolt lock to the rear. I then attempted a reload as fast as I could. I would describe the reload as awkward. I reached up to release the empty mag and then I suddenly realized that I was now holding an empty mag. I dropped it and reached for the spare. I loaded it in, pulled on it to make sure that it was secure in the mag well and reached my thumb to the rear and released the bolt. I immediately realizd that I looked at the rifle and not the target the entire reload process.
After the reload, I attempted to shoot at Ken’s long range steel torso that was 160 yards away with about a 30 degree incline. This is where the trigger becomes a crutch. I could not hit the target standing unsupported. I was shooting my AR with a 4 MOA H-1 at that target unsupported, several times. I then moved to a fence post and still did not hit the steel. I then went to a knee and supported the Tavor on the fence and pressed off a clean shot and hit it dead center.
With the remaining 19 rounds, I went back t the 25 yard line and walked it in while moving left, right and diagnal until I was about 5 yards away and shooting faster as I got closer. This is where I was beginning to notice the recoil impulse. As I would shoot, the rifle would recoil to the rear and the Aimpoint would strike my hat brim. This was not muzzle flip. As the Tavor’s bolt would cycle, it could be felt in my shoulder and it feels like a lot more mass than the bolt cycling in an AR.
As I finished up and handed Mr. Hackathorn his rifle back, we were talking about our observations with the Tavor. As we were talking, Ken was touching the barrel to feel how hot it was and he noticed that the A2 style flash hider was loose and pointing to the right. He told me that this could have been a factor in me not being able to hit the long range target. The flash hider is not supported by a crush washer, it has a jamb nut instead. We don’t know how long this had been loose.
Mr. Hackathorn explained his summation of the Tavor perfectly. He said that like any new gun, you become enamored with it but now hos love for the Tavor is wearing off. The Tavor, in his opinion is the best of the bullpups. You can switch shoulders with it and it won’t spit brass in your face like the AUG. The Tavor also has the same shortcomings as all of the bullpup designs, like the poor trigger and heavy recoil impuse. If the Tavor becomes more popular, Mr. Geissele needs to get to work fast!
I personnaly was not impressed and other than it looking pretty neat, I will keep my ARs. While I was shooting, Ken took some pictures and videos. In the video, you can see the recoil impulse that I am talking about.
Here is a pretty cool shot of the spent case being ejected…
Click the picture for the video…
