After buying 4 lowers, both stripped and complete, I finally took the plunge and bought a PSA upper. It was daily deal, 5.56 10.5" barrel. I have now diversified my stable of uppers which include BCA, Radical, DPMS and a LaRue. I am a tinkerer so none of those (except the LaRue) are in their as delivered condition.
I am looking forward to taking it to the range and breaking it in.
Let us know how the PSA compares to your others. Thanks
Question…is this going to be an AR Pistol or an SBR?
Request…When comparing the PSA or any brand against one another , please make it an Apples to Apples thing so all sides get judged fairly.
Will do, I also took advantage of a one day sale at Primary Arms and picked up a Radical Firearms 16" 5.56 complete upper receiver for $199.
Yes I know their reputation, you can believe I am going to tear that thing down and look at everything and reassemble it to proper torque settings and lube it nicely before I use it, just like I did with my BCA stuff. Funny how I have such confidence in PSA I never think about checking anything, I do but that’s habit more then anything worrying me.
Once I get the uppers from both places ready to go, I’ll do a comparison.
These two uppers are probably my last completed uppers I’ll buy for awhile. I just also bought the fixings for an 18" .223 that I want to build to see if I can shoot long ranges 300+ yards with any accuracy. Ballistic Advantage steel fluted barrel, receiver, assorted parts all making their way to me soon. Man, I love building and tinkering.
OK, so had a few minutes to compare my PSA upper and my Radical Firearms (RF) upper this morning and I wanted to give some initial feedback. Both seem assembled to the same standard. Nothing misaligned, missing or questionable from an assembly standpoint. Both put together well.
Now I wish I can take a picture to illustrate, I tried a dozen times and all I got was out of focus blobs. Let’s talk feed ramps/barrel extension area. I have not head spaced these yet because I have not attached them to a lower, so set that aside. I opened the PSA box excited to view my new upper. Taking a look at the feed ramp/barrel extension area I was a little shocked. Both feed ramps and the edge of the barrel extension seemed to have corrosion on them. Cleaned the area up with CLR and the area is not corrosion but looks like some rounds had been put through it. I don’t know if PSA test fires their uppers or not. I was certainly thrown off by the brownish/rust color initially. However, the ramps are smooth and all else appears ok.
Now the Radical upper. All appears ok in the feed ramp area, but there is a noticeable difference in texture. The ramps and lugs seem rough not smooth like the PSA. I ran a dry q-tip on the ramps and lugs on the PSA, came away fairly intact. Ran it on the RF and it came away pulled apart, obviously the fibers were snagging on something.
Barrels are the last stop on the tour today. The PSA barrel looked really clean, had a burr or two from the rifling, no big deal to address. The RF was dirty as sh!t from manufacturing, it will really need to be cleaned and prepped before I would use it.
Range day tomorrow, so probably won’t be able to do a tear down until next week. I may just take these and run a couple rounds through them just for grins and giggles and elevate any potential issues.
If you can provide day of shooting at the range, any issues and pictures. Thanks
I will do my best.
No range day today, partied too hard at Bike Week last night and my head was not up to the soothing sounds of the firing line.
Good news is I have cleaned both uppers up and they both look good to go. Mounted them to my PSA lowers and they function check fine. The feed ramps on the RF still feel rough, but I’m going to see if I have any firing problems before I work on them.
Side note - the handguard screw issue on the RF bit me. I got two of the three handguard screws out no problem, the third was cross threaded and had to be forced out and cannot be re-used with out rethreading the hole. That’s not happening, she’ll hold fine with the two and won’t shift as the handguard is indexed to the upper receiver and I added lock-tite to the remaining two screws. Also, the muzzle device on the RF was only hand tight I was able to simply unscrew it with zero effort.
PSA test fires their uppers
That’s what I assumed (hoped). This is my first PSA upper and after going through it I am impressed.
OK, time for an update - finally.
Took the PSA to the range along with the Radical. Made sure they were both ready to go, well cleaned and lubed. I added a third to the trip, a newly purchased Foxtrot Mike bufferless .223 12.5" upper (I’ll talk about that at the end).
Ammo on hand - a mix of .223 and 5.56, 55, 62 and 69 grain. Started at 50 yards to zero in (mostly because the 75 and 100 yard lanes were occupied). Both zeroed in pretty quickly and I was getting about 1-2" moa (didn’t have a ruler with me so estimating) consistently using a rifle stand on the range table. Moved up to the 75 yards (100 was still full) and same results off the stand. Ditched the stand to shoot standing in the lane with the gongs and was ringing the bell with both.
Could never get to the 100 yard lanes as I was plugging away at the 50 and 75, others were lining up and waiting for the 100. No big deal. I was happy I had two more functioning, fairly accurate weapons added to my arsenal. I will tell you the PSA with the SS barrel just looks pretty. Also built well, I did nothing but clean and lube before the range and she ate everything I put in her magwell and spit it downrange without an issue. She is slightly nose heavy because of the barrel I presume, but she is my top 3 guns to grab for when I go shooting.
Foxtrot Mike front charging 12.5 bufferless. Nicely made piece, would fire once, jam, clear it, fire misfeed…ugh. Went home reached out to Foxtrot Mike, and had a long discussion about what was going on. Apparently, I did not clean the internals well enough. They ship it with a protectant and needs a fairly decent cleaning before use. I went through it again with CLP fairly vigorously and I could see what I gad left on there initially. They only other thing they said was for about the first 300 rounds only put about 10 or so rounds in each magazine. Took the advice, went back to the range and 200 rounds with zero problems.
Okay, straight answer, y’all. How good are the PSA uppers?
I want to build an IDF-accurate M4 rifle. I have a Zastava M90 that love to shoot, but with arthritis, my shoulders, arms, and wrists are screaming at me for a day or two after a range trip when I practice freehand firing from a standing position and a sling. I just ache.
I need something light now and I hate getting older because of it. I have an Adams Arms short stroke gas piston AR that I absolutely love, but I still have an itch to build a 90s-era Israeli M4 patrol rifle. Light, tough, accurate, reliable. Accuracy is negotiable, reliability is not. How good are DI guns compared to gas piston and how good is the PSA classic upper?
PSA M4 Uppers are on Par with any of it’s Price Class. Better depending on the Quality of the barrel you select?
I did an IDF tribute M4 back when PSA put out a meme Israel Lower a few years back.
That is exactly what I want. That’s great work. Too bad that lower isn’t available anymore.
I have multiple PSA stripped lowers, all good, all took parts with no fitment issues. Assuming similar quality control, I bought a complete PSA upper. Love it. Spent extra for a better barrel, shoots accurately and functions flawlessly. I had a couple hiccups here and there but it was ammo related not equipment related.
When I got the upper I tore it down to check torque specs, and give it a once over to be sure everything was in order. I did not have to do one thing other then lube it up, mate it to a lower and head to the range.
So shopping in this price tier for a complete upper, I would be confident in saying that PSA is the best option out there for sub $500 uppers. I have a couple BCA and Radical that I bought that shoot lights out now. However, they all needed tinkering to get there, PSA did not.
