Les Baer 264 LBC-AR?

[Railroader82]

I'm not wild over AR's. I like them but I got my full about 8 years ago. Something awesome has caught my eye. What makes this awesome is that it's in a caliber that's new, probably low recoil, probably flat shooting, and plenty of lead for deer and perhaps something a larger. Do any of you fine folks have one? Do any of you folks hunt with one?

 

[benchracer]

I don't hunt with one and don't have one. I think it is a nifty cartridge for use in an AR and would like one. The current silliness has brought my AR projects to a screeching halt for awhile. I will not resume my AR projects until I can again buy parts at regular retail price. I refuse to pay the current panic premium built into anything remotely associated with EBR's.

The .264LBC-AR is not a new cartridge. It is a very slight tweak to the 6.5 Grendel chamber design to optimize the round for use with the Hornady 123g AMAX. More importantly, that tweak allowed Les Baer to produce AR's that will fire the Grendel cartridge without being successfully sued by Bill Alexander (the guy who developed the 6.5 Grendel) for copyright infringement.

The 6.5 Grendel nearly became extinct because Bill Alexander was maintaining it as a proprietary cartridge (I don't blame him. It was his baby). A couple of years ago, he finally relented and allowed the Grendel to become a SAAMI cartridge. Now, anyone can build rifles or make ammo for the Grendel.

The .264LBC-AR is essentially a match chamber version of the Grendel with slightly different throat dimensions. Both cartridges offer a level of performance previously unavailable in the AR-15 platform. I hope that they turn out to have a bright future. They deserve to, IMO.

 

[vatackdriver]

I have one of these that is a 24" ss bull as and this is a fine flat shooter w/ low recoil and very accurate. I have had a 16" upper in this caliber and that little short barrel was just as accurate. I havesince seen that since this is such a low volume case you can get just as good results w/ the shorter barrels. It doesn't take a long barrel to burn about 31 grains of powder max. If you were gonna use this to hunt I have seen everything from groundhogs to elk shot with this caliber . A 18-20" barrel would be an awesome light wt hunting setup for deer size rifle.

 

[Railroader82]

Well after hearing you fellas' comments I'd love to have one of these babies!! The Les Baer costs about 2200$. This is of course out of my price range. In fact I have zero AR's right now. Could a guy pick up a cheaper AR and just get the 264 upper?

 

[vatackdriver]

You could do that. The uppers in this caliber run from a " don't let it walk by " price of $800+ to a " its the only one ever made " price of $1500-2000. Components do have some bearing on price but due to availability some are gonna still be in mark up mode. I bought mine for $1350 but I have only seen a few in that range over the last 6 months. I have a guy that lives a mile or two down the road that has a Alexander Arms Overwatch upper w/Bus master lower . The gun has a real nice trigger and a Yankee Hill quad rail, a cpl mags, dies, virgin brass, and a cpl boxes of ammo for $2200 obo. There is another complete rifle for sale on ar-15.com in the firearms for trade section for $150. Good luck!