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Posted: 7/11/2025 9:20:00 AM EDT
| I miss having a .308 win rifle and I keep coming back to the SFAR especially in the 20" barrel. Any owners here wish to add their thoughts on running one of these ? |
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I have the 16 inch. Mine is ammo finicky. It likes soft point 308 hunting ammo. It doesn't feed / function with Lake City 7.62x51. I does function with old South African battle pack 7.62x51. It doesn't like German Dag 7.62x51. My M1A Scout feeds all of the above. Unreliable rifles don't interest me and I have more or less given up shooting my SFAR. |
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Originally Posted By drobs: I have the 16 inch. Mine is ammo finicky. It likes soft point 308 hunting ammo. It doesn't feed / function with Lake City 7.62x51. I does function with old South African battle pack 7.62x51. It doesn't like German Dag 7.62x51. My M1A Scout feeds all of the above. Unreliable rifles don't interest me and I have more or less given up shooting my SFAR. Same for me. Traded it off at a loss. |
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Here's what I've learned owning an SFAR. (20" 6.5 CM - no supressor) 1 - It's not smoothed or worn in, and you have to do that yourself. It will take a magazine or two before the gas settings settle in, and a few hundred rounds to really wear the bolt/reciever smooth. Which means their drag behavior changes. I don't mind, as in practice all this really means is you start at a high gas setting and then throttle back - depending. 2 - the handguard and gas-block are not compatable and will strike each other when fired, wrecking accuracy. Plan on replacing one or both, or hogging out some metal inside the handguard. I replaced mine with a more gneeraous PSA handguard, and hogged it out some too. The gas block actually is pretty good, but it's too fat at the top for the handguard, and will contact. Fortunately, AR15 handguards are cheap, and it takes common AR15 handguards and their barrel nuts. 3 - While I like the factory gas block, the HB Industies replacement valve isn't a bad call. The factory one ran everything at 2 or 3 (out of 3 settings), the new one runs everyting at 4 and 5 (out of 5 settings). Yours may differ. 4 - THE BIG ONE, extractor tension is too low. Mine would fail to eject a lot, especially after a few hundred rounds. Replacing the springs (and rubber o-ring thing) fixed that.  I just run a few hundred rounds through mine at the 1000 yard gong range witout issue.  It's a great gun, but it's also Gen 1, of a great gun. What Ruger Gen 2 (if the do one) needs to do is -Fix the gas-block/handguard mating issue -Polish the reciever a bit more on the inside -Redesign the extractor to have higher tension and be more agressive. -(maybe) polish the chamber a bit better before maloniting it. All of those you can address yourself. And wear in. To say the M1A gas system is better, isn't something I'm going to agree with. But yes, on a gun of this nature, you're going to need to figure out what gas system works with what ammo. RDB too. I don't consider that damning and worthy of dumping a gun over. If your gun is jamming - how? Is it not fully ejecting the spent casing? Pull out your bolt - how easy is it to move the extractor with your finger? It shouldn't be easy - replace the spring-set on the extractor from an AR15 bolt-build kit, if so. If you are getting feed failures, that might be undergassed, so up the gas setting. It also could be your magazines, try different ones. PMags tend to do pretty good for me. At some point I might put in an H-Buffer; but I'm slow to do so. It's remarkable how much milder and more pleaseant the recoil behavior is with the SFAR compared tomuch heavier AR10's, and I attribute a lot of that to the light BCG. Which would imply increasing weight (Such as a heavier buffer), ,might increase jump, which I'm slow to do. Haven't tested that, so maybe that's not right at all. But if I were to do any more adjustments to my SFAR, that would be the next one to test, is a heavier buffer. Right now I don't see the need. If all this seems unacceptalbe to you - I get that. Keep in mind, this is a latest generation Gen 1 release of a game-changer that obsoletes all other AR10's, and I paid $900 for mine brand new. I'd be posting very differently if this were a $4000 LMT. To me, this trade off is perfectly acceptable and I now have a great gun - that I paid very little for, and used spare parts for any and all "upgrades" that I did to it. I love this gun, and shoot the Hell out of it. I shoot mine.. a lot 
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Lazyengineer has put a lot of rounds through his. Good input there. I’m only maybe 300 into mine. 308, 20”. On my 3rd optic, and this will be on there for a long time. First ones were a 2x aimpoint and a 1x5 Burris. First 60 or so rounds were finicky. Some FTE. It really did just start working properly after that. Multiple brands of ammo now just run. Still not sure on accuracy but the 1x10 Griffin optic is nice. Really nice. I was getting some good groups too with cheap factory ball, but I didn’t torque my rings properly and have to start over there. Lesson learned, RTFM on the new torque driver. Attached File The Ruger brake is effective for sure. I was watching my hits, and misses way up there. Steel all over that cliff. Attached File I had pulled the brake and was using a Griffin linear to quiet it down. Yeah, not so loud but no braking and I couldn’t see my impacts. I have the brake back on now. Recoil without it is not bad, but you know it. Attached File I like mine. |
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I have a couple hundred rounds or so, but not over 250, of Federal 150gr soft point .308 through my 20" rifle. I did put an H2 buffer in it before the last outing and it failed to feed the final round from the final magazine. I'm using 10rd mags. This is an improvement. I had put the other gas regulator in but it's largest setting was smaller than the Ruger #2 and it failed to feed the final round with all of the magazines. Switched back to the Ruger and the hacker buffer and got a one fsilure out of 4. l need to number my magazines now and see if that was a fluke, a bad mag or just needs more break in. It is an easy shooting gun though. |
Drugs kicked in now, need sleep, radiation tastes funny at 7 am every day... a bit like victory. - Ginger
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Oh yeah. The trigger on mine was horrendous. First dry fire at home after an initial, thorough cleaning was literally "Ruger should be embarrassed to call this an 'enhanced target trigger.'" It got a little better after some range time with live ammo. But still was pretty bad. So one of the changes before the last outing was swapping the Geiselle High-speed DMR trigger out of its rifle and ordering a new SSA-E from a Father's Day sale for the AR it came out of. Much nicer trigger now. 
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Drugs kicked in now, need sleep, radiation tastes funny at 7 am every day... a bit like victory. - Ginger
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If I was buying today, I'd start with an SFAR. I got into small frame AR 308s a few years ago when POF was the only game in town. I have 2 POF Rogues - a 12.5" SBR, and a 16". I also have an upper with a 16" barrel I'm getting cut down to 14.5 whenever Im back in the states again. So - sorry I don't have any insights into the SFAR, but I do love the small frame 308 platform. I'll eventually end up with a 20" 6.5cm that I'll cut down to 16" for a compact rifle-gas creedmore. Being lighter, they do kick more than a standard large frame 308 and they obviously kick more than and AR15. I like the limbsaver magpul butt pads. The SFAR apparently mitigates felt recoil with a big 'ol brake, but if you take the brake off, you lose the help with recoil. Or so I've heard. Attached File Attached File Attached File Here they both are in slightly different configurations: Attached File |
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I swapped out the handguard to a MI model prior to the first range trip, and discovered that the gas block was not properly installed from the factory. I have the 16" .308. I've only had it to the range a few times and have only about 300-400 rounds through it, 90% suppressed. Even with a suppressor, it ejects pretty weak at the 2pm. I've had it fail to eject a few times after it started getting little dirty, and it ran again when more lube was added. Maybe a tad more finicky than the average AR. The trigger on mine is fantastic and very comparable to a G SSAE which is what I have on most of my rifles. My only advice would be to consider the shorter barrel, as the whole point of the SFAR design is to lower weight. 100fps or so isn't worth it IMO. |
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Originally Posted By Missilegeek: I swapped out the handguard to a MI model prior to the first range trip, and discovered that the gas block was not properly installed from the factory. I have the 16" .308. I've only had it to the range a few times and have only about 300-400 rounds through it, 90% suppressed. Even with a suppressor, it ejects pretty weak at the 2pm. I've had it fail to eject a few times after it started getting little dirty, and it ran again when more lube was added. Maybe a tad more finicky than the average AR. The trigger on mine is fantastic and very comparable to a G SSAE which is what I have on most of my rifles. My only advice would be to consider the shorter barrel, as the whole point of the SFAR design is to lower weight. 100fps or so isn't worth it IMO. Now that you mention it, the SFAR does seen to prefer to run clean and oiled. And yes, the trigger is great. I wish they offered 6.5CM in 16". At SHOT this year they told me they might, but it didn't seem a priority. |
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Originally Posted By jagdkommando: https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/146923/IMG_2454-2892710.jpg I really like my SFAR. It has made "higher end" 308 AR's tough to sell, actually changing the market. I wonder if PSA is now wishing they had moved forward on their DPMS G2 acquisition. Seems like Ruger is selling them quick. |
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Originally Posted By DVCER: I wonder if PSA is now wishing they had moved forward on their DPMS G2 acquisition. Originally Posted By DVCER: Originally Posted By jagdkommando: https://www.ar15.com/media/mediaFiles/146923/IMG_2454-2892710.jpg I really like my SFAR. It has made "higher end" 308 AR's tough to sell, actually changing the market. I wonder if PSA is now wishing they had moved forward on their DPMS G2 acquisition. Honestly I'm now glad they did not The DPMS gen 2 is an older tech attempt and not nearly as good as the SFAR. MAC has a nice review comparison of the AR10 and attempts to compact it that's actuallybquite good (yea yea - MAC) , and the SFAR blows away the DMPS. I did headsup the PSA design team at SHOT to go over and look at the SFAR, which they did - they had never even heard of it - so who knows. |
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I got mine in a trade, very happy with it. Got rid of both of my large frames afterwards. I use mine both suppressed and unsuppressed and it has worked with South African, silver bear, brown bear, wolf, ZQ1, and some new GGG 308 I just got a couple months ago. I don’t think I will ever go back to large frames. |
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Make it "Idiot Proof", along comes a better idiot.
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Originally Posted By CA_TX-Cop: I got mine in a trade, very happy with it. Got rid of both of my large frames afterwards. I use mine both suppressed and unsuppressed and it has worked with South African, silver bear, brown bear, wolf, ZQ1, and some new GGG 308 I just got a couple months ago. I don’t think I will ever go back to large frames. Nobody wants to buy my LF Dpms. I could get maybe 750 for it. That’s all I got for the 16” version. I’ll just keep it for now. Attached File |
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Originally Posted By jagdkommando: It is a Trijicon with a 308 reticle with a Dead Air Nomad Titanium. Originally Posted By jagdkommando: Originally Posted By Kane419: @jagdkommando that a TA31 ? What surpresser and is it titanium ? It is a Trijicon with a 308 reticle with a Dead Air Nomad Titanium. That's a great lightweight .308 setup. |
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My 20 inch has been almost flawless even when used with the OE 3 position gas regulator. Has run 100 percent after moving over to an HB industries 5 position regulator. Currently running an H1 carbine buffer on the stock recoil spring. Mine wears an HB handguard as well as I wanted something a tad more rigid without changing barrel nuts. The 20 inch gets you a rifle length gas port and while I'm sure it's a tad unwieldy with a suppressor on the end, it's a decent lightweight 30 cal semi that still comes in light with an optic on top. |
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