7 lb 9.7 oz Varmint AR with 20" BBL & optic

[Warg]

For the others asking about groups- yes it shoots well. I'm getting less than .75" groups (5 shot) at 100y with Hornady 40 and 45 gr VMAX. For some reason, the barrel does not perform as well with the 32 gr stuff as my best group so far is 1.1". I've some handloads I'll be testing soon as well.

Look in the kitchen section of any store...they sell food scales just like that...

Cool build. Are the dimples a different color than the rest of the barrel? In the first pic, it is hard to tell but appears that way farther down. If so, how did you do this?

Indeed- many kitchen appliance stores sell these. If you dislike shopping as much as I do, get it online.

The dimples are federal brown and the barrel is a lighter color of coyote tan. To do this I painted the entire barrel coyote and let it cure for a good two weeks. I used the air cure Cerakote, BTW. Then I applied a very thin layer of neutral shoe polish to the smooth, non-dimpled area of the barrel and sprayed the dimples the darker brown. Very quickly after spraying I wiped the smooth parts of the barrel with a tack free cloth soaked in acetone. Wet, but not dripping, of course. I worked on small areas at a time- probably 2" to 3" of barrel or so.

There is probably a better way to do this, but my method was faster than masking and has been holding up well.

[Warg]

A couple of more observations while I'm thinking about this one.

The Millet scope mount holds zero fine, but the mount does not return to zero when removed and reinstalled. I did not intend to remove it often, but I did get some sand and crud under the mount and decided to clean it. I've had much better luck with the more expensive mounts like LaRue, Nighforce, ADM, GG&G, and Bobro. Add a few ounces to your lightweight build for a better quality and hassle free scope mount

The lack of an ejection port cover has not been a problem when shooting at the range. It is a problem when packing and upacking in a bag that may accumulate a fair amount of sand and dust like you might encounter in arid climates such as the desert. This is on my to do list.

[hunt_ak]

Thanks for the update. I assume the shoe polish was acting as a 'barrier' between the coyote surface and the brown paint for the dimples. Everything looks incredibly uniform...well done. I might try my hand at something similar someday...

[CGFS]

What was the cost on the barrel dimpling? I'm seriously considering doing this to my AR as it's a bit of a fatty right now.

[devinsdad]

Curious on this as well. The dimpling that ADCO offers is a little to industrial for me, but Pitts dimples look great. Very Knights-like with his pattern. I have a fluted barrel and never thought about doing the flutes in a contrasting color...nice idea.

[Warg]

IIRC, the dimpling was $250.

At the time, Marvin's prices were the following:

Forward of the gas block:
10-12" +25.00
12-14" +50.00
14-16" +75.00
18-20" +100.00

$150 behind the GB

Sandblasting was free and park was $25.

One more update-

I have been using NHMTG mags without issue, but recently discovered that the bolt will not lock back using 20 or 30 round PMAGs. This is somewhat of an issue as some of the handloads I've been using are just a smidge too long for the metal mags. I've tried 35 PMAGs and none of them work. All of these work on my other ARs, but they all sport LMT catches and different lower MFRs. I tried the upper on a couple of the working lowers and the bolt would lock with the PMAGs so I can rule out the bolt carrier/upper.

Oddly, the catch is long enough to engage the mag followers and doesn't bind.

I swapped the bolt catch with another (not sure where it was sourced) and still have the problem. I'll try an LMT catch this week, but if that doesn't work I'll simply stick to metal mags and use standard OAL 204 rounds. I don't think the varmints will care

[Warg]

Very Knights-like with his pattern

As it should