The Russian Mosin Nagant Forum

So..I was looking to put together an AR upper in 7.62x39 and got en email from Classic Arms that they had a sale going on their Bear Creek complete uppers in that caliber. Checked out some reviews and decided that at $225 shipped for a complete upper including BCG and charging handle just couldn't be beat. Ordered on Saturday, weekend of Columbus Day so no shipping on Monday. Fedex delivered it the following Tuesday so a week basically from the order processing to it arriving, can't complain about that.

Here it is, straight out of the box.


Finish is very good on the metal, the upper receiver has a Square forge marking. Standard A2 front sight base and flash hider.
Overall inspection I was pleased with the fit and finish on the BCG and bolt as well as the barrel extension.

BUT... the bore was dirty. Nasty, dirty and rusty. The tag with it said it was test fired on 9/13/17 and I have to assume that after they test fired the three rounds, it was put into a rack as it was. This was the first dry patch through it.




Ran a bore brush soaked with Hoppes through it ten times, then dry patched it. Repeated until the patch came out only slightly dirty.



Pinned it onto the lower of one of my "spare" AR's and installed the scope mount and scope I had waiting for it. I picked up three ASC magazines for it, two 20 round and one 10. We're limited to 10 here if we use it for hunting.



Since archery is already open for deer here and not long until firearm, I don't shoot on my little 100 yard range behind the shop until after the season closes, so loaded everything up and made the drive to the Conservation Area range about 30 miles from me today.



Fed it a diet of cheap Monarch lacquer coated steel case and it ran 100%, all three mags functioned perfectly, gonna have to get some more I can tell. Overall I was happy with the accuracy, I have some good brass cased stuff I'll run through it next and see how it likes that. I will have to load for it eventually, the soft point steel cased stuff I had for the WASR doesn't fare well in this, the soft lead point gets a good sized "flat" knocked into it when it chambers which opens up the group to about 2" at 50 yards. If I hand-load the round, the group sinks back to around 3/4".

Here's my final three shot group of the day, no complaints from this guy.



I put a 5 ounce buffer in the lower to use with the x39, it ejected the empties at about 5 o'clock and inside about a 2' circle.



Overall I have to say it was a heck of a good deal for $225.

Nice!

Wish my AK grouped like that!

The test rounds must have been Yugo milsurp. Rust? I didn't know AR's would group like that.

steelbuttplate wrote:The test rounds must have been Yugo milsurp. Rust? I didn't know AR's would group like that.

Headstamp says the test rounds were Barnaul.

I've got a 1:8 twist AR build that will shoot the 3/4" bullseye out the target at 100 yards with my 69gr reloads with a cheap Anderson barrel. I was really surprised at this one with the Monarch, but then again that was the best group of the bunch, it tended to throw a flyer or two out of five rounds. Will be fun to reload for, I emailed Bear Creek for information on the bore size that they use so I know whether to load .308 or .311 for it, hopefully they respond so I don't have to slug the barrel.

That's some darn nice shooting!

Especially considering it isn't even free floated! I've wondered how the Bear Creek Arsenal uppers hold up, so I'll be following this thread closely.

Thanks for posting!

RazorBurn wrote:That's some darn nice shooting!

Especially considering it isn't even free floated! I've wondered how the Bear Creek Arsenal uppers hold up, so I'll be following this thread closely.

Thanks for posting!

I plan on swapping the handguard and gas block out and going free float at some point. I found that with my long arms I have a tendency for my front hand to slide forward and eventually contact the HOT metal plate that the spring-loaded handguards have at the front.