|
Didn't have metal rail forends before.. as I stated, with the regular M4 or M16A2 handgrips heat was usually a non-issue, plus the regular forend isn't painful to hang onto like the rail system. Yes, they make covers for them.. no, not every M-4 ends up with those on it, and if they do they get dirty/damaged/lost easily. Try carrying around an AR with a front rail and nothing to hang onto up there but a bare rail, and imagine doing that for 10 hours or more a day for a year.
FWIW myself and an awful lot of other current and former combat arms Soldiers shake our heads at "tactical" and "tacticool" crap. Most of the time it's just garbage to hang off a rifle somewhere, or an otherwise pedestrian bag that has MOLLE loops on it for no reason, or anything in ACU digital camo (the worst camo ever btw). I see a lot of AR-15 type rifles with 15 pounds of garbage hanging off of them, miles of rails that are pretty much useless, etc. I'm not a promoter of all that crap. My ArmaLite has a set of normal midlength forends on it, a Bushnell optic that was 1/5 the price of an Aimpoint and I can't tell the difference in performance for my purposes, and the same CAA pistol grip and Mamba Geronimo 3-point sling that I carried on my last trip to Baghdad. It actually does not have a vertical foregrip in it.. there is no need. I will probably not shoot as many rounds out of it in its entire life as I would in a couple days of CQB live fire training back at Bragg.
|