Got my early-style (Model 601) lower receivers Wednesday, and thought I’d poke around the manufacturer’s site today.
They have a nice article that appeared in Shotgun News, about their experimental model AR-15 reproduction.
I don’t know when the article was written, but it was before NDS started reproducing the brown, round, tapered handguards. The interesting thing about the reproduction is that it has the charging handle on top of the upper receiver, like an AR-10, instead of on the back of it as we’re all used to. Ten of these rifles went to Ft. Benning for testing, and the top-charging model was never put into production.
The parts required to build your own reproduction of the prototype AR-15 were available when the article was written; but I know that they have been ‘Out of stock – There will be no more for some time’ for months. (Regular non-FA upper receivers may not be available until 2014; let alone this special version.)