How many of you "Don't" own an AR?

I always liked the AR15 platform. Mag fed for easy loading and unloading between stands, modular hand guard for Arca mounts and range finders. I can order parts and screw one together at home and shoot sub moa.

Then I noticed all the real deal killers around, the guys who kill over 100 a year and hit double digits some nights, had switched to bolt guns.

Then our obese Illinois governor decided he was going to outlaw modern sporting rifles. While I think civil disobedience is the way to go, I’m not getting my $6000 thermal seized.

I build a Remington 700, at home, with a detachable mag and an arca rail. The same things I looked for in an AR.

Im would say I used to be under 50% on shooting with an ar.

After switching to a bolt gun I have shot at 8 animals standing still this year and killed 7. Shot at two running and killed one. I had one stand where 4 coyotes came in and follow up shots were no big deal.

I never had success like that with an ar platform.

They say when you are in the zone playing basketball the hoop seems like it's 5 foot in diameter. Right now I feel like I'm shooting at elk instead of coyotes.

Then in a weird turn of fate they allow us to us straight wall rifles in Illinois including ar15s with a single shot mag for the 3 months before they were outlawed. I built a 450 bushmaster and just knew the AR15 platform was going to be the ultimate. Short barrel , adjustable stock to compensate for thick winter clothing. After hunting with it a few days I just wasn’t as in love with it as I thought. While it was short, it’s also tall with lots of parts that stick out to grab sticks, clothing, and tree stands.
 
Ever since I started hunting with a suppressed AR my multible kills have went up. If calling and you kill the first one you are instantly ready for one returning when the foxbang brings them back. If on bait a lot of the time that second coyote will come sneaking back in within 10 to 20 minutes after you kill his buddy almost like he really wasn't sure he heard a shot and he doesn't want his buddy eating all the grub. However if you don't kill the first DRT and they run off together they never come back. At least that's been my experiance here in KY. Maybe we just have dumb coyotes.
 
I own a couple and there is a reason. I called in 3 coyotes, shot 1 and the other 2 ran off ( using bolt gun ). I went back 2 weeks later with my very first AR. I called in a single and killed it. On my next set I called in a triple and in a matter of seconds I had 3 coyotes down, 4 shots and 4 coyote down on the first with my new AR. In my opinion an AR 15 is the best choice for coyote hunting. Sometime I wonder why I am back to shooting a bolt gun.
 
Have 4, 2 daytime guns , 2 nighttime guns in case someone else wants to go along. Perfect for coyotes cause I don’t care if they get dirty or dinged. Ar,s seem to come up very natural to me.As said before great for customizing and for putting suppressors on.
 
With as many different body styles, sizes, and shapes as there are it's no wonder hunters prefer a wide variety of firearms. I'm just glad I live somewhere I can try a variety and choose what I like. It's also understandable to have a bias against a style with which you've had bad personal experiences with.

I have all styles except single shots, and that's just probably because there aren't many decent ones available. AR's fit me well, and are very accurate and easy to work on and all of those things were a surprise to me 30 years ago. I had no use for one until Klinton "banned" them, I think like a lot of people I just had to have one then and was surprised at how well it shot.

Honestly, right now, my favorite style is an old school lever gun. I'm seriously considering carrying a Win 94 coyote hunting some time, but I know it's a serious handicap on a hung up coyote. I'd love to mess with one of the Henry Long Rangers some time, by most accounts they're pretty accurate. Wish they were all threaded for suppressors.
 
This happened 5-6 years ago. Was hunting central Illinois with a buddy in one of those little bean fields tucked into trees probably 50 yds wide couple hundred long that kept going in a dogleg to the right. Had a couple small hollers that came into it. Well we had called it for 20 minutes or so and started to pick up, at that time I was using an nv scope and bud had my scanner. Must have been a bright night cause bud said he thought he saw something come out of a holler bought 60 yds up. Got the rifle on it and sure enough there’s a coyote. Long story short I think I put 8 rounds after it, it ran away from me and I was shooting and missing and it just about got to the woods at the end and it turned around and came back. Guess it heard the rounds hitting in front of it which turned it. Well it started back and I kept missing probably cause I lead to much and disappeared into another holler on its way back. We had a good laugh, you can only do that with an AR. I usually run 20 rnd mags, u just never know.
 
For those who watch YouTube coyote hunting The last stand with Nemnich will show you what a guy with a AR can do with a full mag. On the other hand the guys on CRPH are masters of the coyote snipers. Both great shows.
 
I have 4 AR15's and an AR10. I built 4 of the 5. While calling the last 5 years, I've used AR's about as often as I use one of my bolt guns. There are advantages to each. With a bolt action, I'll chamber a round when I sit down for a stand. ARs action closing is too load so I'll chamber the round at my truck before walking out to a stand. As others have mentioned, I also don't like how AR's spray brass and make brass dirtier than a bolt gun. They are also loader than bolt actions. In general, bolt actions feel better in my hands to carry and shoot. It does depend on the gun though. If I have more than one coyote coming in, I have a strong preference in my AR over a bolt action. For big game hunting, I've never used an AR.

The AR is really nice for fast follow up shots. I built a 223 wylde that weighs over 12lbs. It isn't fun to carry but it has minimal recoil and it is very easy to make fast follow up shots. I can think of a couple coyotes I've killed with AR follow up shots that I may not have been fast enough with a bolt action. Most of the follow up shots with my bolt guns are more than fast enough. I do believe a skilled bolt action hunter is going to be faster and more effective on follow up shots than most guys hunting with an AR. I was able to kill a triple on stand last week with my bolt action. Couldn't have done it any better with my AR.

The irony is Democrats putting restrictions on AR's and trying to completely ban them, have resulted in significantly more AR sales than there would have been otherwise. Without the initial Clinton ban or any other talk of AR bans, I think there would be at least 50% less AR's in the USA today. There might only be 10% of the AR numbers. Democrats are more effective at selling guns than any advertising campaign.
 
I hunt both at night and day with AR-15s because they are effective and for my safety. When 1/2 the population around me are here illegally you never know what you might run into as I once found out.
It is rare when I don't have an AR close by anymore. Due to my current mobility issues and always hunting alone I'm always ready for dumb coyotes and South America's unknown trash.

Far from unusual these days around here. Sad..
 
I currently have a few more than ten. Four of them I take to the rat fields every spring, a couple are set up for tactical use if it ever comes to that. The rest are range toys that I am constantly trying to tweak and improve upon.

I find I still have much to learn about the platform and therein lies the fun factor.
 
bob123 said:
I own 1 working on 2 however I was never going to get one until the politicians in Wash said I could not have one
another Obiden gun ban so I bought one
Click to expand...
That’s kind of what happened with me as well after Trump got an office all the stupid Obama prices of the AR‘s went to pennies on the dollar. Figured I better strike all the iron was hot! I bought two 243 AR 10 uppers under 300 bucks from BCA and bought two complete arrow M5 lowers for 200 bucks each on Black Friday. Basically the same price as entry level plastic stocked bolt gun. Both shoot a third of an inch group at 100 yards with my hand loads. Never tried heavy for caliber bullets for what ge twists were designed for. Just like pushing the envelope on them with light 55 and 60 grain projectiles over 4K for flat shooting.
 
i have to giggle at all the "its a spray and pray" firearm comments. :ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:

seriously its not 1986 anymore, manufacturing and quality has come a LONG way in the last 20 years - try some decent ammo, or god forbid a quality handloads, throw on an optic that didnt come out of the clearance bin for $50 and apply proper marksmanship techniques to it. the results may supprise the living daylights out of you.


i had shot a few during the clinton ban, wasnt real impressed. finally picked up a bushmaster "orc" around obama. just because i could. that little carbine blew my mind with it accuracy - it shot as well with factory ammo as my 700 heavy barrel did, and with handloads during its first round of testing i shot one of the best groups i'd ever produced in my life - it was a 0.3xx group, essentially a dirty clover leaf - with that bone stock carbine with a bushnell 4-12x40 on it.


have a friend of a friend who i'm helping get back into reloading. he just built an ar with a krieger barrel. sent me a pic of a group he shot with hornady black 75gr HPBT at 300yd that makes my 100 yd groups look embarrassing. dirty hole.

now i appreciate that theres some sh!tit production quality products out there too - so please save those comments. we're all aware every manufacturer can have a sh!t product hit the market, especailly when it comes to barrels. but just because your cousin's nephew's bubbed up $65 barrel that he installed on the tailgate of his pickup doesnt shoot for crap doesnt mean the whole platform is a turd sammich.


point is - just because its a semi-auto doesnt make them a spray and pray firearm platform. or mean it cant perform when it comes to accuracy. sub half-MOA is totally a doable thing. and you dont need to spend $5000 to do it either.
 
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