Some of you might ask yourself 'Why did you buy a Chiappa? A rifle made from Polymer and relatively bad reputation ." I know, I do too.
....But it was too good of a deal (less than $200 brand new shipped/taxed), plus 'plastic' is not as big of a thorn in my eye, especially on a .22lr, as it might be to some of you. -It is not like I am taking this to war, I won't be dragging it through mud, there is no risk of it falling from a cliff or getting smashed up anywhere.
I would have never bought the original M4 from Chiappa, but in their Gen2 version they have worked out bugs and upgraded certain things over the years, it also came with a 1/2x28 threaded barrel and 'upgraded' hand guard.
I simply did not want to spend 2-3x the amount of money for a .22 CMMG build that I could achieve with this CHEAPAPA, lol.
I do have the S&W M&P 15-22 Pro Series as well, but reason I also bought a Chiappa is that at least all its internals can be switched to a mil-spec uppper/lower, try that with the M&P 15-22... good luck! So the turd can be polished...
But why polish a turd? -Why not?
Does it have to 'look' like a turd, or can you throw cheap (but better than factory) stuff on it and make it look a little better... Like mentioned before, I have a forged aluminium upper on hand and Chiappas internals swap right over, also the free float handguard I purchased fits perfectly, no issues when it comes to upgrading Chiappas receivers, I just need an aluminium lower eventually to make it all fit together without any modifications.
Chiappa sells .22 conversion kits that will snap right on to your 5.56 Mil-Spec receiver, I purchased a complete rifle assembled from them as it was cheaper than the conversion kit, but in reality I did not know that the assembled rifles receivers are slightly different dimensions than a mil-spec, where as their conversion kit comes with an upper that will fit on a mil-spec lower, it is designed to do that.
I can still swap all internals into better receivers eventually, just not put Chiappas 'assembled .22' on to a mil-spec.
BlaBlaBla I could go on...
Now to the designing part:
-I found a 3d print file online that looks somewhat like my handguard
-I measured the gap between my upper& free float handguard and some other dimensions of the handguard.
-I cut the 3d print handguard from the file apart on the computer and added some stuff
-My 'test' prints center hole and edges where WAYYY to big to hold in place like I wanted it to be.
-So I redesigned the hole so when I tighten down the barrel nut of my free float guard, it will slightly 'squish' it into place (by the nut& between receivers) while everything is TIGHT, incl. the barrel.
-Took me 3 prints to get it to look like this, ~25mins a print, so quick and easy testing. I could get better results if I made the triangle of my designed part shorter, as I had to sand about 3mm down to make it look like I wanted it to. But I am happy as it looks 1000x better. I also lightly sanded it to make it less shiny. This part was printed with PETG as it is more durable, impact resistant, thermal resistant than PLA.
Here is a picture of my 'spacer' design in the print software
6.jpg
From the Side
4.jpg
From the top
2.jpg
Rifle in full
3.jpg
1.jpg
Again... this plastic spacer I had to design ONLY for the Chiappa's factory upper receiver. Once I upgrade to mil-spec my free-float handguard nut sits how it should on the aluminium upper receiver, so I won't have to add plastic to it.
*Barrel shroud is also 3D printed with PETG and 1/2x28 threads. I live in Canada, so suppressors are illegal, therefore barrel shroud for looks.
Not a bad looking turd, right?
If you want more pictures of the design let me know of which parts, I'll try my best to help someone out with the same dilemma.
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