Henry U.S. Survival Rifle AR-7 - Myths and Rumours

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOUR 3 - POI Shifts with Barrel Temperature

Comments from forums include "my plastic coated barrel is obviously designed for one or two accurate shots. After that heat takes a toll on accuracy", "My experience is after 7 or so rapid shots the barrel heats. This causes the Grouping to open up much more" and "when the polymer barrel heats up it starts to warp and will walk rounds right off the target.

These comments seem to be true. To test this I fired an 8 round group at a target. Shots were rapid. I marked the bullet holes in the target with orange dots. I then fired nine 8 round groups at the nine targets. The last group was fired at the first target with the orange dots. The nine groups were fired as fast as I could refill magazines, the first 72 rounds in 4 min 10.47 sec, the second 70 rounds plus ejecting two Misfires in 4 min 8.53 sec. I marked the bullet holes with orange stickers with black X on them. I then allowed the barrel to cool and fired a final 8 round group at the first target.

The first photo is the first group. The second photo the orange stickers covering the first group and the ninth group. The third photo is the first and ninth group covered with the orange stickers and the tenth group. The fourth photo is the complete target before the final cool barrel group was fired.

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Group size seems to have opened up and shifted to the right but trying to maintain speed degraded marksmanship so some of this could be the shooter not the firearm.

I think I will try this in a different format to see if the results are different. I'll shoot a slow well aimed group, then four fast mags off target to heat the barrel. Then another slow well aimed group. Four more fast mags off target to heat the barrel more followed by a final well aimed group.

[JEBar]

looking forward to your report, it should be interesting

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOUR 4 - The Breech is Polymer/Plastic

Ok, I don't know it this is a rumour, an unclear explanation or another change in the rifle design. I read two posts where the writer claimed that the breech was made of polymer or plastic. When a failure to eject occurred and the rim of the cartridge case was pushed into the breech it damaged it and eventually caused enough damage that the bolt would not go fully home.

On my rifle the breech end is metal. There are three round spots where the polymer is visible through the metal on the breech face. It would be possible for the cartridge case rim to hit these polymer spots. I have fired 3978 rounds through my rifle and had 87 failures to eject. I did not track the types of failures to eject, some the of empty cartridge cases were pushed back into the chamber, some were wedged between the breech face and the bolt and some resulted in a stovepipe. So far there is no noticeable damage on my barrel.

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The Armalite and Charter Arms variants had aluminum barrels with a metal barrel liner. I do not know what the barrels were like on the Survival Arms or AR-7 Industries variants.

If anyone has a polymer or plastic barrel with a different breech than shown in my photos could you post a photo and list the manufacturer and model number of your rifle?

I contacted Herny Repeating Arms to see if the could provide me with a list of variations but they were unable to provide any information.

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOUR 5 - Full Auto When Dirty

Posts include "I found out that if you use dirty ammo the AR-7 can go full auto in as little as 200 rounds without cleaning" and "it would occasionally give you bursts but that was after shooting and crap built up in the receiver".

I can't get mine to due this. First time I fired 1013 rounds without cleaning the rifle. This included 80 rounds from the ranges misfire box. The ammunition was dirty and covered in powdered rust from the inside of the container.

The last session I fired 754 rounds without cleaning the rifle. On the last range trip I had a couple of light strikes. I cleaned the rifle and for the first time removed the firing pin. Prior to removing it the firing pin would move forward and backward with some resistance and would not move side to side. After cleaning in moves forward and backward easily and has some side to side movement.

I think it would be possible to build up enough carbon between the firing pin and the bolt that it could jam in to forward position causing a slam fire as a new cartridge is loaded into the chamber. I don't think the trigger and hammer engagement could be affected. There has never been that much carbon or debris in the receiver.

Photos are the carbon build up on the firing pin and the firing pin and bolt. The firing pin retaining pin can be removed with a 1/8" punch and put back in with a roll pin punch. The retaining pin does not need to be completely removed.

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Video on how the AR-7 works.(Not my video)
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2I7_52-vpOc

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOUR 6 - Firing Mechanism Wears Out.

Posts include - "I've heard the action wears out easily in these weapons. As such, I've always heard never use it as a plinker." and "the firing mechanism inside is famous for wearing and starting to double or triple when fired."

I guess this depends on what your definition of easily is. I have now fired 4260 rounds through my rifle. I cleaned it last week and disassembled the firing mechanism (trigger, trigger pivot pin, hammer and hammer pivot pin). I was surprised how little wear there is on these parts. The trigger finish has worn off where it rubs on the receiver. The pivot pins have lost the finish on the ends and the bolt has lost quite a bit of its finish. There is no significant wearing visible where the trigger and hammer engage each other. The hammer is shiny where it contacts the firing pin and there a tiny amount of peening on the hammer. Not enough to see but could be felt when rubbing a finger across it.

Everything is intact and functioning and nothing is close to being worn out. I have never experienced a double or triple.

The threading on the receiver where the barrel nut threads on are still strong. Not sure how many times I have assembled and disassembled the rifle.

[JEBar]

thank you for your continued reporting .... Henry's AR-7 is clearly a fine product

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOUR 7 - The Henry U.S. Survival Rifle (AR-7) Floats

In my experience it does not float. When I first purchased the rifle I tested it in a tub of water. It was basicallly under water in 21.42 seconds. By comparison I tested my Charter Arms AR-7 and the stock sank butt down but several inches of the stock where it joins the receiver remained above the surface for 30 minutes before I got bored and stopped timing. Both rifles were tested with the components stowed in the stock.

Yesterday I tried the Henry again. I filled a tub with water. The tub was large enough that the rifle would be able to sink in any orientation. The rifle was stowed in the stock with two magazines. I placed the stock on its side on the waters surface and started timing. The stock rotated 90 degrees and then started sinking butt first. At 48.53 seconds it was completely submerged and would have kept sinking if I had deeper water. When I removed it the stock was completely full of water.

I think it would float longer assembled because it would float barrel down trapping more air against the butt cap. If I can find a suitable body of water I will try it. With the rifle stowed all the weight is at the butt end which causes the butt to sink first and all the air comes out where the hole for the bolt which attaches to the receiver is.

[armycat]

I broke the 5,000 round mark. At 5,138 rounds today. The action is broken in and the rifle is running more reliably with lower velocity ammo around 1050 fps. Copper plated ammo works best and CCI Mini Mags are my go to ammo. Mostly 36 gr CPHP only because that is more common than the 40 gr CPRN.

Failure rate is hovering around 5.2%. Today I had 8 misfires, 7 of which fired second try. One wouldn't fire. 50% were the first round where I manually operated the bolt to chamber the first round. It's been 408 rounds since it was last cleaned and there is a think layer of carbon on the breech face. I'll give it a good cleaning and see if the misfires go away. By comparison my 10/22 failure rate was 2% today but it was cleaner to start with and failures were FTFs.

Tried some CCI Clean 40 gr Poly Coated Lead Red Round Nose. 50 rounds, no FTF or FTE but 4 on the misfires were with this ammo.

[armycat]

It's been almost a year but hit 6,056 rounds today. The failure rate is about 4.9% for all FTE, FTF and misfires. Nothing has worn out and no parts have broken yet.

The failure is probably higher than what is should be due to high round counts without cleaning, some questionable ammo being run through it and some of the other tests I have done on it. None of my other rifle have been thrown down ice fishing holes to see if the float, left outside at -40 overnight to see if the cold causes parts to break when fired or spent days sitting on the bottom of a boat hull bouncing around with other gear.

A U.S. Survival rifle that is properly broken in and cleaned every 100-200 rounds would likely have a much lower failure rate.

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOU 8 - You can't clean a U.S. Survival Rifle with solvent because the plastic will melt.

This may or may not be true depending on what you consider to be solvent. Acetone would certainly do damage to the ABS parts of the rifle. Not sure about Varsol.

I use a lot of Hoppes No 9 solvent when cleaning most of my firearms and it has never done any damage. I have also used liquid Wipeout, aerosol Wipeout, M-Pro 7 Gun Cleaner, Oil and Solvent with no adverse affect.

[armycat]

MYTH AND RUMOUR 9 - Cleaning a firearm with WD-40 may cause ammunition to fail to function.

This is not specific to the Henry U.S. Survival Rifle, but I read a post where it was claimed that some police had experienced ammunition failures after cleaning their firearms with WD-40 and the keeping them loaded. I have used WD-40 on several firearms but have never stored them loaded. I had a hard time believing a WD-40 film on a firearm would lead to ammunition failure.

Decided to try and test this but took it to the extreme. I put 16 cartridges into five pill bottles. Eight CCI Mini Mag 36 gr CPHO and eight CCI Standard Velocity 40 gr LRN in each bottle bullets facing down. I sprayed in WD-40 in each bottle until there was enough liquid that it covered the joint between the bullet and the cartridge case. I filled five bottles with the intent of firing 16 rounds today, 16 rounds tomorrow and the rest next weekend. I thought the WD-40 would cause some problems but figured it would take several days to occur.

I hit the range and fired 8 CCI Mini Mag and 8 CCI SV that had not been exposed to WD-40. I had one misfire with the CCI Mini Mag and it fired the second try. I then loaded up 8 CCI Mini Mags that had been in WD-40 for 1.5 hours. The first two rounds fired but the recoil and audible report was extremely light. So much so I removed the barrel to verify there was no obstruction. I was shooting paper that was shot up and at 50m I couldn’t see if the bullets were hitting the target. On the third round I switched to a 25m steel target so I could see the impact. Third round had a weak recoil and report but hit the target. Forth round was even weaker and did not hit the target. I removed the barrel and sure enough there was a barrel obstruction, I had to return home to deal with the problem so that was the end of testing. Bullet made it 4” down the bore. It was easy to push out. I will return to the range and will finish off the remaining rounds from the first bottle. These cartridges are not in WD-40. The cartridges in the remaining pill bottles that are still soaking I will pull the bullets and check the powder.

I still have a hard time believing a light coating of WD-40 on a firearm would cause ammunition failure but it appears it is possible.

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[Travlin]

My experience with WD 40 was that it gunked up and formed an almost cosmoline around the extractor on my 97 Winchester shotgun causing it to fail to extract a loaded or fired round. That was many years ago so now if I am in a situation with a wet firearm , the only thing I use it for is to spray on a cloth and wipe down the outside until I can be more thorough. One of the men that I used to hunt with in Penn. was told to "get with the times " and used it on his Marlin 36 32 Spec. The rifle failed him when he needed to shoot a nice deer . He learned not to use WD -40 on the internals of his rifles.

[armycat]

My experience with WD 40 was that it gunked up and formed an almost cosmoline around the extractor on my 97 Winchester shotgun causing it to fail to extract a loaded or fired round. That was many years ago so now if I am in a situation with a wet firearm , the only thing I use it for is to spray on a cloth and wipe down the outside until I can be more thorough. One of the men that I used to hunt with in Penn. was told to "get with the times " and used it on his Marlin 36 32 Spec. The rifle failed him when he needed to shoot a nice deer . He learned not to use WD -40 on the internals of his rifles.

Interesting. I may have to play around with WD-40 some more to try to gauge how little can be a potential problem.

[armycat]

MYTHS AND RUMOURS 10

Firing the action with the barrel removed damages the guide rod and springs. Well the poster does state at times, so this could be possible however in my experience it is not true.

When re-assembling the rifle the action must be cocked to put the action spring guide, springs and bolt back in the receiver. Once the bolt is pushed back in the receiver the cocking handle can be inserted and this retains the bolt in the receiver. Since the action is cocked I often fire the action to release the trigger spring with the barrel still off. With the barrel off the bolt sits slightly forward of where it would sit when the barrel is in place but not far enough forward to prevent the hammer from lining up with the cut out in the bolt, When the barrel is attached the cocking handle does not contact the receiver. With the barrel removed the cocking handle contacts the receiver. When the action is fired the hammer strikes the firing pin and bolt which would exert a forward force on it pushing the cocking handle into the receiver at the front of the groove it travels in. Although I have not experienced any problems this could potentially cause some peening on the receiver or possibly crack the receiver so firing without the barrel may not be recommended but I will continue to do it.

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