Colt 6450 on top, custom "factory" Anvil Arms/Rock River Arms SBR on bottom

In June of 2007 I happened on Jensen Arms website and found that they had Colt model 6450s in stock for just under $1,200, shipped to my local FFL.  I had always wanted a 9mm AR and figured that I could save a little money on ammunition costs as well as use the 9mm at the local private indoor range I had joined and at the local steel matches.  I wasn't terribly thrilled with the fact that it came with an A1-style carry handle upper with iron sights, as opposed to a flat-top upper ready for optics mounting, but I knew that this was something I could always change out later.  I had also resisted purchasing a 9mm AR earlier because of the cost of the only known reliable magazines, factory Colts, at $40+ per 32-round magazine.  However, C-Products was now producing 9mm magazines and they were available for a much more reasonable $20+/- per magazine (more on this later).

I received the rifle at the end of June, took it to the range to sight in, shot it in one carbine match, and shelved it.  After one outing I could tell that what I really wanted was a flat-top short barreled rifle (SBR) with a suppressor.  Since I couldn't bring myself to engrave the lower and chop the barrel of a factory Colt I decided instead to go the factory SBR route and contacted Spike's Tactical and Anvil Arms as they were both in-state for me and I had heard that both were capable of producing factory registered SBRs so that I could avoid the engraving.  In a move I'd come to regret, I settled on Anvil because they answered my emails and I didn't have time to make phone calls during regular business hours. What I ordered up, in October of 2007, was an Anvil Arms factory registered SBR lower with a Hahn dedicated magazine block, Magpul CTR commercial stock and MIAD pistol grip, and Rock River Arms 10.5" upper.  You can read more about the saga of this rifle here.

What follows below is a photographic comparison of the two carbines, with notes about each, and ending with my conclusions on what I would do differently today. It bears mentioning that in the photos below the Anvil has been cleaned while the Colt has approximately 400 rounds on it without cleaning.

If I were starting from scratch today, I'd do things quite a bit differently.  For starters, I'm over any concern about engraving the lower, or chopping the factory Colt barrel.  Given that the Colt 16" upper is lighter than the RRA 10.5", I would chop the Colt barrel just behind the FSB (or just in front of it if I wanted to keep the fixed FSB for a 10.5" barrel) and have it re-threaded.  The only non-Colt part I would use is the flattop 9mm upper from RRA (or other sources).  The reason for this is that I see the Anvil/RRA/DPMS/Hahn as a sub-standard example made by a company that is a parts wharehouse and assembler at best.  I knew this going in, and rationalized it by telling myself it was "only a game gun", but it cost me a year in the making, and I already had the Colt sitting in my safe. The Colt, when completed would have been significantly more expensive but I would not constantly be wondering "what will go wrong next".  I also would have saved myself the trouble of the constant headaches, lies, excuses, delays, mis-management, and other nonsense that went along with trying to deal with Anvil Arms.

I also promised a note on the C-Products magazines.  This has turned out to be a false economy.  Yes, they cost half as much, but in my experience they only work half the time (if that), meaning that it's the same price to get two functional magazines out of these people.  This applies to their 5.56 products as well in my experience.  I have tried sending magazines back to the company to have them "corrected" only to have them lose the magazines and then start dodging my phone calls when I try to find out where the magazines are.  At this point I would only trust the Colt factory magazines for any kind of critical use, and would rather go through the (admittedly crap in their own right) ProMags for fun purposes.  I would, and will, avoid C-Products magazines like the plague, and this dislike and distrust for the company and it's products is what keeps me from getting involved in other calibers like the 6.8 SPC and the 5.45x39 in the AR platform.  While I like seeing a company that will meet the demands of the market for alternate-caliber magazines for the AR, I can't support a compay that makes products that are a gamble at best and then won't face up to the problems and hides from phone calls about correcting the problem.