So before I purchased an upper for my Anderson lower, I did tons of research. I knew I wanted to get one in 7.62x39 because I already had a VZ2008 and did not want to add a new caliber if I didn't have to. There were plenty of options out there, but Radical had an HBAR with a really nice hand guard. Not to mention, their lifetime warranty seemed great!
I saw a lot, I MEAN A LOT, of mixed reviews on Radical. Most of the poor reviews were from 3-4 years ago when Radical first started to come on the AR scene. As the reviews got more and more recent, it seemed to get better. Maybe they were fixing the issues that were causing complaints? I dug deeper, read more reviews, and watched tons of videos (both positive and negative comments).
I finally found the upper I wanted in stock. Atlantic Firearms down on the Eastern Shore, MD had it for $100 less than Radical's website!!!! ( http://www.atlanticfirearms.com/com...-complete-upper-assembly-detail.html?Itemid=0 ) It was one of 3 left in stock and I decided to give it a go. Atlantic Firearms got it to me in 2 days with standard shipping fee ($15.00). Extra kudos for that!!!
I ordered an ASC 10-rd magazine (again, after much review). Apparently AR's in x39 have issues when it comes to the magazines feeding correctly. My magazine came in last Friday and yesterday I got out the range to sight it in.
I was sighting in a Vortex SPARC-II red dot at 25yds. I had Winchester White Box brass cartridges (~$0.90/round) and a mix of Wolf and Tula steel (~$0.24/round). I started with the Winchester. It fired flawlessly, but had issues ejecting the spent casing. The winchester case in just a hair longer than the Tula. I'm assuming that is the issue. I will look into that further. After 5 rounds of the same issue, I switched to the steel Tula. It fired and ejected with very minor issues. The only issue I had was one I was expecting. Cheaper steel ammo has harder primers and the simple fix is a $16 enhanced firing pin. Out of 200 Tula/Wolf rounds, only 6 rounds failed to fire due to light primer strikes. That's a 3% failure to fire. With those that did fire, I had 100% success eject/cycle. By the end of the afternoon, I was shooting 10-round groups inside an inch. Not too bad IMO.
In the end, I am very pleased with the Radical upper! The fit and finish is superb. It functions well. It may not cycle ammo that is almost $1.00/round, but loves to eat up ammo that is 1/4 of the price. I'll take that any day! I'm going to replace the firing pin and see if that fixes the light primer strikes.
So, this is my review of a Radical Firearms' upper in 7.62x39. If you have your own experience with one, please let me know your thoughts. If anyone has questions, ask away and I will try my best to answer them.
I saw a lot, I MEAN A LOT, of mixed reviews on Radical. Most of the poor reviews were from 3-4 years ago when Radical first started to come on the AR scene. As the reviews got more and more recent, it seemed to get better. Maybe they were fixing the issues that were causing complaints? I dug deeper, read more reviews, and watched tons of videos (both positive and negative comments).
I finally found the upper I wanted in stock. Atlantic Firearms down on the Eastern Shore, MD had it for $100 less than Radical's website!!!! ( http://www.atlanticfirearms.com/com...-complete-upper-assembly-detail.html?Itemid=0 ) It was one of 3 left in stock and I decided to give it a go. Atlantic Firearms got it to me in 2 days with standard shipping fee ($15.00). Extra kudos for that!!!
I ordered an ASC 10-rd magazine (again, after much review). Apparently AR's in x39 have issues when it comes to the magazines feeding correctly. My magazine came in last Friday and yesterday I got out the range to sight it in.
I was sighting in a Vortex SPARC-II red dot at 25yds. I had Winchester White Box brass cartridges (~$0.90/round) and a mix of Wolf and Tula steel (~$0.24/round). I started with the Winchester. It fired flawlessly, but had issues ejecting the spent casing. The winchester case in just a hair longer than the Tula. I'm assuming that is the issue. I will look into that further. After 5 rounds of the same issue, I switched to the steel Tula. It fired and ejected with very minor issues. The only issue I had was one I was expecting. Cheaper steel ammo has harder primers and the simple fix is a $16 enhanced firing pin. Out of 200 Tula/Wolf rounds, only 6 rounds failed to fire due to light primer strikes. That's a 3% failure to fire. With those that did fire, I had 100% success eject/cycle. By the end of the afternoon, I was shooting 10-round groups inside an inch. Not too bad IMO.
In the end, I am very pleased with the Radical upper! The fit and finish is superb. It functions well. It may not cycle ammo that is almost $1.00/round, but loves to eat up ammo that is 1/4 of the price. I'll take that any day! I'm going to replace the firing pin and see if that fixes the light primer strikes.
So, this is my review of a Radical Firearms' upper in 7.62x39. If you have your own experience with one, please let me know your thoughts. If anyone has questions, ask away and I will try my best to answer them.
