Awhile back, a friend suggested that I should do a John Wayne gun to be different from the other custom guns I was doing. Not really much customizing you can do to a Winchester 94, so decided on Green Berets. My first attempt was lame, to say the least, and it was brought to my attention by a friend (well, now he is. lol). So decided not to cut corners and did a LOT of research, built quite a few retro's including a 601, an XM16E1 "nodak", and A1 and an A2/203. After feeling they were pretty close, I went back and decided to do the "John Wayne gun".



I had already done a Nodak, so wanted to step it up a bit and start with a modern lower. Picked a Spike's Tactical Calico for 2 reasons. 1) The artwork can be removed and replaced with retro logos and 2) I would NEVER build a gun with that silly looking lower....but I had one, so it won the coin toss.



There are several changes that need to be made, but a couple are obvious. The fence around the mag button and the rear section. So with Dremel in hand, it started.....



And then the other side (I had tried having it laser engraved after filling the logo, but the laser didn't like the 2 different materials)....



After much sanding and resanding, covered it with primer to see how it looked.....



Cleaned up the rear takedown spring "tunnel" that had to be created from scratch, and called it good. Then onto the stock

The guy that requested it wanted the rifle to look exact, so that meant duct tape and the whole 9 yards, but how to distinguish it as a John Wayne gun to anyone that didn't recognize it from the movie? Answer......embed the Duke into the stock.

I've done some hydrographics, but because of expansion in water, and sometimes unexpected expansion, faces get to be pretty difficult. But learning what all is happening when hydrographing, I tried a different route. Printed him out on hydrographic film and stuck him right to wet paint...



Then after drying, removed the film and then it was coating, sanding, coating, sanding, and repeating that more times than I cared to count, and then lots of buffing, it came out pretty good! And pretty much a mirror finish. Since the sling point was going to be taped over, I used an old A1 stock because I didn't have the heart to paint an E1 stock.



Then added the duct tape, cerakoted the receivers, and voila! John Wayne XM16E1, minus the .308 size magazine they felt the movie needed.

Cool.

I am curious on the anomalies in the engraving up close. Does it look livable?

great American, great movie, great rifle.... 10/10

Nice

Not really. Filled it with JB Weld, and when the laser hit it, the groove would be wider than on the aluminum. Needs to be hand engraved or filled with aluminum.

Looks great.
Here's the Duke's other M16.



"He musta took them with him ... or they wudda taken THIS!"



 

I don't get why they went with so much authenticity in the movie and then have those huge magazines.

the stuntgun that met the tree was a plastic Matel maurauder

Until today, I hadn't noticed that the prop guy put tape on the butt of the Marauder to match the real guns.



Nice touch.

You should do an homage to George  Takei's weapons.  His M16 from the Green Berets, a phaser, and a foil.  I bet his phaser is in his mag pouch.  Am I dating myself?

Those old tiger stripe cammies are cool looking

Hey, I built a rifle with a Calico Jack lower  

But it was on sale for $65 from DSG so I had to

I had something like this in the mid 60's when I was a kid. It made noise's like a rifle, but had a red flash hider if I remember right. Great movie and miss ya Duke.

And OP, very nice work and effort on your XM16E1. It looks great.

Had one too, in the mid 60s. But mine was different. Every time one pulled the trigger, it would play random tracks of battle sounds, explosions, small arms fire, etc. Only 1 track was actually full auto fire like the M16 would make, which rocked. But I couldn't control which track of sounds it would play. Other then the FA sound, I hated all the other war sounds tracks.

Mid 60s my brother and I also had a couple full auto, cap firing, Thompson submachineguns. We loved those things. Both Identical, but one was black and wood colored, the other factory painted camo. Now those were bad arse loaded up with caps and shooting FA. Found a pic of the exact version we had..

See?! I knew everyone else had cooler parents than me in the 60's. We got a slingshot or a capgun. lol
Just kidding. We had great parents. Just not those really cool toys.

JB Weld fills it in great! lol
Nah, it's a decent lower and I like Spikes. Just not a fan of that one. A lot of people don't like my spike's gun.

       



 

It's unique but not unlikeable. I get a Marvel/Deadpool vibe from it

I haven't watch "The Green Berets" in years but if I'm not mistaken John Wayne never fires a shot from any weapon.  I found that strange, but still a very good movie.

My uncle let me play with full sized C130 and F4 in the sixties and I never fired a shot my whole time in Vietnam but I did help quite a few others use up lots of ordnance. Launched 3000 plus sorties with the 20 F4E I was Maintenance Officer for with the 421st TFS Black widows.