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FAL/L1A1 Building Project and Receiver Choice
boeboe
Member Posts: 3,331
I had been thinking about building an FAL for a while, but not seriously. Then I ordered a bunch of AR15 magazine rebuild kits from Tapco for $25.00 each and low and behold, in one of the haversacks there was an inch FAL US made compliance set, including the hammer, trigger, sear, gas piston and charging handle, which cost about $75.00. They told me to keep it if I wanted, and I took that as a sign from God I was suppose to build an FAL. since then, whenever I order from Tapco I go ahead and pick up some of their new surplus L1A1 parts, such as bolt, bolt carrier, springs and such.I have a friend who has built three FALs from parts kits, so I would enlist him for necessary help as well as borrowing tools.I've gone through about three parts kits, lower grade ones, picking out the best of the parts to stash back for my own project and selling the rest at gunshows and such. Except for the upper receiver I have enough to build the rifle (though I would like to upgrade some items), but am really trying to decide on the receiver and barrel to buy for the finished project.I was looking hard at the Williams Arms aluminum receiver, but then saw the write-up on DSA's web site about them being dangerous. Now, I think that might be so much propoganda. After all, the AR10 uses an aluminum receiver with no problem. And a friend pointed out that DSA dumped on Enterprise Arms FAL from the beginning as well. I asked Williams about the negative press they were getting from DSA and their response was that they had tested the aluminum receiver for 10 years before ever selling it to the public. My thought are if it were to go through 10 years of their shooting, that would be more that I'd probably ever shoot it. And I really like the idea of the lighter weight aluminum would give. Then again, the Imbel receivers are down to $209.00. What to do....I'm still considering the DSA SS heavy fluted barrel for it. This would, after all, be my "poor man's" SR25. I know at $600.00 that's an expensive proposition, and think DSA is generally overpriced, but think it would be a pretty sharp rifle and at least approach sniper class sub-moa accuracy. Then again, the meduium contour barrel is considerably less, and I could use standard handguards. So has anyone heard the performance difference between the heavy fluted and medium contour DSA barrels?So, opinion please, on the direction I'm going. What do you think of the Williams aluminum receiver? Would I be just as well off to buy a new surplus Israelii barrel? Any suggestions on this project in general?
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