I had been piecing together the parts for this build for a few months, and finally got a chance to put it all together. Here's the parts list:
-Bravo Company Manufacturing (BCM) 16" pencil bbl midlength with Troy/VTAC TRX rail
-BCM Gunfighter Mod 5 charging handle
-LMT bolt carrier group (from the parts box) with BCM extractor spring upgrade and new LMT small parts - extractor, pin, cam pin
-Aimpoint PRO
-LaRue M68 mount
-Tango Down VFG and Battle Grip
-Surefire X300 with XT07 switch
-Vltor A5 IMod stock
-Geissele SSA trigger kit
-Knight Armament 300m flip up rear sight (from parts box, not pictured)
-LMT front sight, from parts box
-Noveske forged receiver
-VTAC padded sling and LUSA front sling attachment
The Noveske receiver is a preproduction prototype of their new forged receiver, and features a flared mag well, integral trigger guard, and reinforced receiver extension ring. It is very cleanly machined and the mag well opening is very fast without being at all obtrusive.
The rifle was function tested and sighted in with Black Hills ammunition, to include their new commercial 77gr OTM load, which is the well proven Mk262 load.
After staring at the gun in its stylish black configuration for a few days, I couldn't take it any more and got the Krylon out.
As you can see, the LMT front sight didn't make it on the build, nor did the XT07 switch. I wanted the light at 12:00, in front of the sight tower, as I'd done on a previous build. This setup makes the light fairly ambidextrous and also lets me keep roughly the same support hand position/grip whether I am shooting in daylight or low light. The master plan was to put the XT07 switch behind the front sight so that the support thumb could hit the switch. The plan was foiled when 1) the mounting knob on the LMT front sight was so huge that I couldn't get my thumb close to the front of the gun and 2) the rear plate for the XT07 was so long that I lose all the real estate gained with the long handguard. A new Daniel Defense fixed front sight is on order.
The build comes out to 8.0 lbs unloaded without magazine, and is very light and handy. The long thin forend tube is very comfortable and allows an aggressive hand position for driving the gun. The only downside so far is that the light weight of the barrel contributes to significantly more muzzle whip than on guns with standard weight barrels. It moves very quickly from target to target, but shot to shot on the same target is slower. There is no free lunch.
The gun is ready for VTAC Carbine 1.5 next week. More pics and AAR to follow. I will be doing some more detailed accuracy testing with this barrel setup and the Black Hills 77gr OTM after the class, as well as testing a Battle Comp 2.0. Stay tuned for more, and check out the 10-8 Performance Facebook page for more pics of this blaster.
