After seeing Buckjay’s incredible .22LR build, I knew I wanted to do something similar. Unfortunately, the SH incident occurred right when I started my build so it has taken a few months to complete. The recent ammo shortage has done nothing short of convince me that an AR-platform .22LR rightfully belongs in every AR owner’s safe. I have had a great time during the various iterations of this build and have learned first-hand what components work as advertised (Redi-Mag Better-Mag) and which ones have survived off of marketing (CMMG BHOA).
Without further adieu…
(click on any of the parts to link to their product pages)
Haven’t had a chance to shoot it yet (with the ULW barrel installed), but I am headed to the farm in the next two weeks and I’m sure it will see a brick or two. This rifle functioned flawlessly while running a Spike’s M4 profile .22LR barrel while I was waiting on the TACCOM to arrive. I did have an issue with getting Black Dog Machine 25 round mags to hold the bolt open on the last round using a CMMG BHOA and numerous combinations of different CMMG/BDM magazine versions. It was then I found out about the Redi-Mag Better-Mag adapter and since then I have been 100% on the bolt hold-open issue. You do have to switch to S&W mags but after having owned just about all of them, I have to say that S&W are probably the best feeding/loading .22LR magazines available (Just don’t throw them on the ground and do a Sig Sauer sand/mud shovelling on them!!!).
For those of you with no experience with TACCOM, I can’t say enough about their stellar customer service. Tim answered every email I sent him within a business day and was happy to address any issues (break-in, cleaning, usage, etc.). Great company, superb offerings and I’ll be going to them for all of my .22LR needs from here on. Also, Mark Larue stepped in after I had purchased a counterfeit LT755 magnifier mount and went to TOS’s Industry Forum to inquire about it. I was just wondering if the mount was genuine. If it was deemed a copy, I was going to throw it away and purchase a real one. Mark told me to send it in and they would send me a replacement free of charge. That is above and beyond in my book! Larue had me a customer before this incident but now they might as well consider me a “disciple”!
It’s crazy seeing guys put more money into a 22lr than I do in my BCM or Colt. Broke dick college student syndrome is a PITA sometimes. Very nice rifle though.
I like it. Rimfire is a cheap way to get trigger time. Great review, my wheels are turning on how to upgrade my CMMG 22 upper. Thanks for all the links.
nice rig man. I too recently finished my sweet dedicated .22 AR but unfortunately am stuck with BDM X-Form mags until the S&W ones become common again. When they do, I’ll get the better mag adapter.
I wanted to have a dedicated .22 that mirrored my 14.5" Noveske .223. As soon as the 13.5" NSR arrives, it will be 97% identical. I’ll kind of be saving money (from here on out) as I will be able to use the .22 for weapon manipulation, shooting drills and plinking. Plus, I always cringe when I get home from a weekend at the lake and I have gone through 500 .223 rounds. Now instead of burning through 1000 rounds of the expensive stuff a month, I can divide my time between the two rifles and save a couple hundred a month. The .22 should pay for itself in a little over two years.
It has a built-in tensioned dedent that snugs it up against the magwell. You just slide it up from underneath, press the mag release button in order to allow it to clear, continue sliding upwards, and slide the bolt release interface mechanism into the adapter from above the lower while making sure that it also engages the standard bolt release.
I think it is an intelligent design as it does not require any disassembly of the lower in order to install reduced tension bolt release springs (CMMG BHOA) or design variants of the standard Mil-Spec bolt release (Catch22). In order to transition my lower to a .223 upper, all I have to do is pop-out the Pressure Plug and remove the Better-Mag adapter. The entire operation takes about 20 tool-free seconds.
Handling this rifle is EXACTLY like handling my 14.5" Noveske with respect to controls, furniture, optics, etc. When I do go to my “real” rifle, it is comforting to know that I have been putting time in with a cheaper cost-per-round stand-in that has the exact same manual of arms and “feel”.
Should I ever choose, I could easily transition this platform to another caliber at the expense of a barrel, gas block, gas tube and BCG.
If you really think about it, having a gen 2 lower and VLTOR MUR is completely unnecessary (for any caliber) in the first place.
thanks for the response.
could someone could tell me exactly how much longer S&W mags are than Black Dog mags? i need to know if they will fit in my UW Gear mag pouches.
thanks
Just to update the thread, my 13.5" NSR came in so today I swapped out my VLTOR MUR-1A (going to use it on a Mega billet lower) for a VLTOR MUR-1S and also replaced the 11" NSR with the 13.5" model. I figured the slick-sided 1S was a better fit for the build as forward assist is pretty much useless on this rifle.
Sorry for the horrible pics. I can’t find the good camera and I am in a hurry to get out of Dodge for the weekend!
