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6.5 Grendel Carbine

longrange454

Private
Full Member
Minuteman
Sep 2, 2014
125
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N.W. ILL.
I have a PSA lower. Want to put a Carbine Length 18" upper on it . Will the rifle length buffer give me problems? My first build that's why i'm asking.
 
Rifle length buffer systems work fine with any gas system length, the two have nothing to do with each other.
But please tell me you're not considering a carbine gas system on a 18" barrel?
 
18" bbl, shortest gas length I'd recommend for a 6.5 Grendel is an intermediate and a rifle length wouldn't hurt you

YMMV
 
I don't even put carbine length gas systems on 16 inch barrels anymore. They just run so much better with intermediate length gas. On 18 in. barrels, I run rifle length.
 
Thats better. Personally I wouldn't consider carbine on anything longer than 12.5", all my 14.5" are mid and 16's are either intermediate or rifle length.
 
High probability you'll want to heavy up the rifle buffer with a mid length gas on 18", 6.5 Grendel.
What is port diameter?
 
IMHO, you will want a heavier than stadard rifle buffer given a 0.082 port at mid length location, 18" bbl in 6.5 GrendelGrendel. You'll want an adjustable gas block also.
 
BHW doesn't offer intermediate, so it's definitely not that. You didn't listen to the old crotchety fellows at BHW that said rifle length is bad juju did you?
 
BHW doesn't offer intermediate, so it's definitely not that. You didn't listen to the old crotchety fellows at BHW that said rifle length is bad juju did you?
Nope. JP has been making RLGS 18" Grendels for almost as long as 6.5 Grendel rifles have been in production-one of the early adopters, and those guns run great.

18" MLGS Grendel runs great with .076" ports. .082" is a bit large for my liking, but not as bad as .094" ports on MLGS. If you see .094" MLGS 18", you will really need to choke it on the front, and tame it in the back as well.
 
Nope. JP has been making RLGS 18" Grendels for almost as long as 6.5 Grendel rifles have been in production-one of the early adopters, and those guns run great.
For sure, most of my Grendel experience is with JP RLGS (thanks for the abbreviation idea BTW, it'll save on typing) barrels. But don't tell the BHW guys that...
 
I have had 5 different Grendels. The longer the gas system, the smoother the rifle shoots, and the easier it is to mitigate the already low recoil of the Grendel. Shorter gas systems usually create more recoil, faster operating speeds for the bolt/bolt carrier. I have found that I prefer the rifle length gas systems.

You can change the weight of the buffer regardless of whether you have a rifle, or carbine buffer system. You can also use an adjustable gas system. The smoothest system I have had was a rifle length gas tube, adjustable gas block, with a rifle buffer system that I added one extra heavy weight into. That was one smooth shooting rifle.
 
Something else I found out is that with shorter gas systems, the primers tend to show a little more flattening. Rounds that looked fine in my rifle length gas system gun, showed a little more primer flattening in the gun with the shorter gas system.

TonyTheTiger is right about brass abuse..I had forgotten about the primer issue until Tony mentioned brass abuse. I never worried much about it as the Chronograph confirmed what I had hoped by not loading max powder charges...that I was well within normal velocities. I used Lapua brass and quit counting how many loadings I got from the brass after about 8-10 loadings. Once I hit 8-10 loadings I would get about 2-4 case failures per 100 rounds even though cases were annealed. Failures were loose primer pockets and a few cracked necks even though the cases got regular annealing.