Yet Another M1S Upper Report

[hugginsvilleH&A]

thanks pitt for the info that sounds like you got yours dialed in pretty good , will try the fire lap , thanks again, great info

[Pitt300]

Lapping is just something else to try.
It will NOT cure any major mechanical problems w/gun.

[Flewis]

Well, a gunsmith at the shop I use looked at the M1S Fireball... unfortunately he wasn't the one I normally deal with and I'm not impressed.

He said the barrel nut was fine.

He then put a bore-sighter on the rifle and said the scope changed zero when you tapped on it. Personally, I think he was moving his bore-sighter when tapping on the setup because I took the scope back home (same rings too), put them on my .223 rifle and shot repeated 5 shot groups at 100 yards that were all under 1". I also think it would be odd to have two separate scopes that shot the same poor groups (since this is the second scope I've tried).

I asked about the bore diameter and he said it couldn't be too tight since his .30 cal bore-sighter fit in the bore. I quit listening at that point.

Anyway, I called Paul at M1S and he was a great guy to talk to. He asked that I send the upper back to him with some of my spent brass and he would find out what the problem was. So far I'm pleased with M1S's support, Paul really seemed to be interested.

[snowhack]

I see a lot of flack sent toward M1S, but I agree that their service and people skills are pretty good. Some places don't even respond to e-mails or general questions. When they do it's a ganeric answer, weeks or months later or incomplete or rude. M1S is not a gun builder just a supply hub, basically, w/ a small capacity to tech and assemble parts. They get their parts from verious forge houses and manufactures and assemble them.


SIDE NOTE: Mine has the "key hole" forge mark on the upper, some others do not. Look at some of the "big" manufactures and notice that same key hole mark...Remington's new R-15, Stag's ARs, S&W's AR, etc...they all have it. M1S just cuts out one of the middle men.

[kurtz]

Originally Posted by kurtz

I probably won't be able to mess with mine for a week or so but I'm going to give the lap a try....

I ended up hand lapping mine using the borebrush / patch method doing 400 strokes with 800 grit lapping compound...then fire lapped with 8 shots of long bearing surface sub-sonic 220s coated with polishing compound.......

It worked .....groups went from 3 and 4 inch to a little over 1"......velocity came up and pressure signs on some of the hotter loads went away.....thanks Pitt300


kurtz

[Flewis]

Originally Posted by kurtz

I ended up hand lapping mine using the borebrush / patch method doing 400 strokes with 800 grit lapping compound...then fire lapped with 8 shots of long bearing surface sub-sonic 220s coated with polishing compound.......

It worked .....groups went from 3 and 4 inch to a little over 1"......velocity came up and pressure signs on some of the hotter loads went away.....thanks Pitt300


kurtz

Can you give us instructions on what you did? Where did you get the compound? Did you just coat a patch and run it up/down the barrel?

[kurtz]

Originally Posted by Flewis

Can you give us instructions on what you did? Where did you get the compound? Did you just coat a patch and run it up/down the barrel?

I had never done one myself until this one.....did a few google searches, found a couple different ways to do it, picked the way that suited what equipment I had...

- need a strong cleaning rod, I used a Tipton
- a .30cal bronze bore brush, one with a little use on it so it can be pulled or pushed the other direction without being removed from the bore.
- a pack of 3"x3" patches, I used Outers 42357
- 800 grit lapping compound, I got mine from Brownells
- bottle of Break Free CLP

fold a patch in half over the brush....saturate it with CLP....insert it from the receiver end to the beginning of the throat.....put a mark on the cleaning rod even with the end of the receiver, I used a paint pen.....push it through the bore until about half of the patch comes out the muzzle.....put another mark on the rod.....practice pulling and pushing the rod from mark to mark, the patch will take on a shape almost like a cylinder.....pull out and change the patch.....repeat with CLP only for 8 or 10 passes to shape the patch.....pull out and wipe a coating of lapping compound on the patch.....insert and lap from mark to mark, I changed the patch about every 25 passes....I did this for 300 passes.....then switched to pushing the lapping compound coated patches from chamber end to muzzle end.....the easiest way I found to do this was to thread the brush on the rod just a couple turns.....push the patch from chamber out the muzzle.....spin the brush a couple times, unthread it from the rod.....pull the rod out...thread the brush back on....push through to muzzle....repeat until done.....clean the hell out of everything when finished.....

fire lapped for 8 shots as previously described......

not saying it will work in every case but it worked in mine after finding out the bore was pretty tight...

shot over 200 round of various loads today....all groups were under 1.25"....much better than the 3" and 4" groups I was getting with the same loads.....

hope this helps...

kurtz

[Flewis]

Thanks for the info Kurtz!

A little update on mine. Paul at M1S has the upper and left me a message saying that he didn't see anything on visual inspection. Sounds like he is going to take it to the range early this week and see if he can repeat my problems and find out what is causing them.

Now for a new twist. I was at the gunshow last weekend and spoke to the J&T Distributing/Doublestar guys. I own one of their stainless bull barrel target uppers in .223 that I'm very pleased with. I noticed they had .300 Whisper in their catalog and asked them about the barrels. The guy said they didn't have any at the show but just got a new shipment of them in a couple days before.

I called J&T the following Monday and asked about the barrels. They're ER Shaw (same that M1S uses I think) with 0.125 gas ports at the carbine position. They were in the catalog as .300 Whisper and I asked the guy on the phone if they were true Whisper or 300-221 Fireball. He said they were Whisper. I went ahead and ordered an upper set up in the same configuration as my M1S. It arrived last Friday. The barrel is stamped .300 Whisper but the chamber appears to be the same length as my M1S at 2.180 max COAL.

I cleaned it thoroughly and shot it Saturday. It wouldn't cycle with the loads that I got working on the M1S. I took the gas block off and checked the ports. The barrel port was 0.125. The problem was the gas tube wasn't aligned properly in the gas block. It was blocking about half the port (the tube needed to be further back in the block). It is pinned in the block so the easiest solution was to just run a drill bit down in the block to take some material off the gas tube. After fixing that it cycled flawlessly.

So far the results are promising. I got about 1 inch groups at 100 yards with sub-sonic 220 SMKs and 208 AMaxes and that was with the first 40 rounds. I expect better as it breaks in. Also, it doesn't gouge my brass no matter what magazine I use. I won't be able to compare feed ramps until I get the M1S upper back.

[snowhack]

Originally Posted by snowhack

I see a lot of flack sent toward M1S, but I agree that their service and people skills are pretty good. Some places don't even respond to e-mails or general questions. When they do it's a ganeric answer, weeks or months later or incomplete or rude. M1S is not a gun builder just a supply hub, basically, w/ a small capacity to tech and assemble parts. They get their parts from verious forge houses and manufactures and assemble them.


SIDE NOTE: Mine has the "key hole" forge mark on the upper, some others do not. Look at some of the "big" manufactures and notice that same key hole mark...Remington's new R-15, Stag's ARs, S&W's AR, etc...they all have it. M1S just cuts out one of the middle men.

kind'a sounds familiar...........

[interceptor]

Well, you have all heard me bitching about my M1S upper lately. Last load through it was 9.3gn H110 and Hornady 208gn A-Max, printed a group of roughly 5-6" at both 100 and 200 yards. This sucked.

Now, segway to Sunday's range session.

Same gun, same ammo, same everything. Brought a pile of ammo of the previously mentioned ammo just for fun, ran a little through the chrono, then shot a group for sh!ts and giggles. To my surprise it now posted a true 1 MOA pattern at 100 yards. Fluke, so I did it again, and again. Same result.

So, the gun/ammo that ran minute of bad guy at 100 now is a MOA. Go figure. Maybe it sensed my vile thoughts towards it and decided to straighten up and run right for fear of going under the lathe. Who knows...?

At any rate, I'm out of the 208's, now have a stock of 220 SMK's. Will stick with them.

BTW, 11.8 gn AA1680 and 220 gn SMK loaded to a OAL 2.200" delivered an average 10 round string of 1025fps. No report on accuracy yet, sad to admit I just put them in the berm and not at a target, but I'm off to the bench to cook up some more.