[img]www.smashcase.150m.com/hbar_title01.jpg[/img]
Excuse the lousy pic; best I could find quickly.


Not long before these guns came out, information was released about Delta Force for the first time (-Delta was a classified organization) after the attempted rescue of the hostages in Iran in 1979 (Desert One).  Of course, this led to a series of bad Chuck Norris movies and to the "Delta" guns by Colt.

The "Delta HBAR" (R6600-DH) was a package Colt put together to try to sell the heavy barrel concept to the public.  Heavy barrels are cheaper to produce, as less machining to the barrel blank is needed.  Anyway, since the early, accurate "match" ARs of the day had heavy barrels (made from high-end match barrel blanks, something that Colt didn't do, of course), Colt decided they could sell the HBAR concept by claiming superior accuracy.  After all, aren't the target rifles' barrels thick and heavy?

In order to help sell this and a few other models, they decided to use the "Delta" name.  This mystical name implied (falsely) that the Army's most elite units were using these guns, and therefore they MUST be the best.  Naturally, most folks bought into the marketing and the HBAR era had begun.

The Colt Delta-HBAR was simply an AR15A2 with a heavy barrel, using a standard, non-match chrome-lined barrel, and included a carry-handle scope mount and a cheap Tasco rubber-armored scope with a special mount to connect to the carry-handle mount, and a cheek-piece for the stock so you could see through the scope.  Oh, it also had the super-special red-triangle sticker on the stock!  Clearly, the mark of an elite military unit!!!  [rolleyes]

It's taken almost 20 years for most folks to figure out that HBARs suck for most uses, but finally lightweight barrels are making a strong comeback in the AR world.  Hallelujah!

-Troy