OK, guys, here it is. The first installment of my Pistol Caliber AR projects.
First, lemme say THANKS to Circuits, JAFO, Kaliburz, NordicG3K, and especially Gloftoe for their help, input, loans, and donations (JAFO) for this project.
So, what did I do? I took an Olympic Arms 9mm setup--which uses either the costly ugly STEN mags with the square pipe section welded to them or the inexpensive but personally annoying SOCOM block--and switched it to a system that uses the existing AR mag catch.
First I took a Colt two-piece mag block and modified it to fit the STEN mags. The front block looked like this:
And now it looks like this:
I then took the rear block, which looked like this:
And modified it to look like this:
Then I installed the blocks into the lower, fitted the mags in the appropriate place, and notched them. Here's what that looks like:
As you can see, I had to take the "wings" of the feed ramp down somewhat to allow the bolt to clear them.
This is what it looks like all closed up and ready to test fire:
The extra space that the cartridge needs to travel to get to the Olympic system forcing cone turned out to be a non-issue. So far, feeding has been flawless. Another fringe benefit of this modified system is that the rear block sits right underneath the ejector-spring setup that Oly uses, and acts as a sort-of shield, protecting it from any damage from over-insertions that can happen with the Oly-modified magazines.
This project was really an experiment to see if it would work (though Circuits already proved that it does). Now that I've experienced it myself, the next project--due to be finished in about a month--will prove
very interesting.