The Myth of The Unreliable AR?

We’re all heard it. The AR is an unreliable hunk of aluminum that will jam every. single. time. its even remotely dirty, right? If its not squeaky clean, no specks of carbon, and HAS to have a gallon of lube to run, right?

Yep, we’ve all heard it.

So in my last carbine course I decided to take that myth to task. Run a well-built AR pistol through all of the drills I put the students through, with just a minimal coating of CLP, then at the end of the day bury the weapon in some thick Carolina river bottom mud.

We’ve had a fair amount of rain, making the trip back off the range interesting, but that’s another topic for another day. Point is, we’ve got some grimy, nasty, sticky river bottom mud that can permeate everything. So I dug some up:

And then I laid my PSA pistol down in the hole and buried the action.

Let it sit for a bit, pick it up, then empty the magazine:

All rounds fired, bolt locks to the rear, functioned flawlessly:

After that I ran the little carbine the rest of the weekend, no cleaning, no lube…..and no failures. Just to prove the point. The weapon works.

So what are the takeaways?

• Have a clean, well-made carbine from the get-go that’s not over-lubricated.
• Keep the ejection port cover (aka dust cover) closed after firing.
• And have good mags. Mine are plain-jane GI spec with brown anti-tilt followers and I’ve got some D&H mags as well. The old green followers caused problems, but you can upgrade those.

Need training? I can help with that.