If you wanted to have several good quality stripped AR lowers on hand, what would you buy?

I don’t necessarily want the most expensive (even if the best for some reason), but I’m not looking for cheap for the sake of being cheap, either. For example, even the most expensive Wilson Combat receivers are less than $200 and I’d be willing to pay that much if desirable.

I'm a fan of Aero Precision lowers. They can be had for $50-$150 depending on model and features.

One of the things I like about them, is they thread the rear takedown pin hole so you can put a set screw in it. No more losing or crushing the spring during stock installation or changes.

I stocked up on Geissele and Sons of Liberty Gun Works stripped lowers. I like them because they are of excellent quality and also they are M16 cut, which was important to me. If you catch them on sale they can be had for around $150 or less for a stripped lower in my experience.

Seems every time I buy a stripped lower, I start assembling a gun. I never keep the stripped lowers around long without adding parts.

Thanks for the replies, but what is "M16 cut"?

I believe I have seen the term before, but never bothered to ask.

I've probably built up 7-8 stripped lowers and a couple of semi-complete lowers over the years. To be honest, I've noticed little difference between Palmetto State Armory, BCM, Aeroprecision and Sons of Liberty Gunworks, so I don't think you lose much going cheap (although I've never tried really cheap like Anderson). I would certainly have no hesitation going with BCM, Aeroprecision or SOLG - and if you can find blemished on sale so much the better.

Use the money you save to buy a decent Geissele trigger, Radian ambi. safety, the stock of your choice and a spring/buffer weight combo tuned to your rifle.

And as a fellow CO resident, I too have recently purchased a couple of lowers (blemished BCM complete lower and stripped SOLG lower) for the same reason you're thinking about this.

And I agree, stripped lowers inevitably have a way of morphing into complete rifles.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
If you wanted to have several good quality stripped AR lowers on hand, what would you buy?

I don’t necessarily want the most expensive (even if the best for some reason), but I’m not looking for cheap for the sake of being cheap, either. For example, even the most expensive Wilson Combat receivers are less than $200 and I’d be willing to pay that much if desirable.

Been a little bit but last time I checked Wilson’s were sub $100.
I bought a bunch for $85 each not too long ago.

So yes Wilson is my go to but also grabbed some Aeros.

Rainer has Grey Ghosts for $60 heard they are decent stuff.
Don’t have any personally
https://www.rainierarms.com/gr...r-15-stripped-lower/

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
Thanks for the replies, but what is "M16 cut"?

I believe I have seen the term before, but never bothered to ask.

Basically it’s dimensionally exactly the same as a machine gun lower, just without the extra hole. There’s no thickening of the receiver near the safety lever hole and the bottom of the receiver isn’t raised in the rear either. It’s the closest to the original design and doesn’t have any nanny oriented design alterations so that’s all I buy anymore.

quote:

Originally posted by Lt CHEG:
Basically it’s dimensionally exactly the same as a machine gun lower, just without the extra hole.

Thanks; good to know.

Wilson Combat does have some receivers for not much more than $100 as well. I just cited the most expensive one.

I don’t know if I could recommend Aero right now, I’m still waiting on a stripped lower bought on Black Friday. LGS didn’t have any in stock and ordered one for me. Called a couple times and order hasn’t been processed by Aero. Google the shit and I see many unhappy Aero customers waiting forever for random products, but FFL stuff like lowers seem to be the worst. Idk what’s going on over there right now.

quote:

Originally posted by SigSauerP226:
I don’t know if I could recommend Aero right now, I’m still waiting on a stripped lower bought on Black Friday. LGS didn’t have any in stock and ordered one for me. Called a couple times and order hasn’t been processed by Aero. Google the shit and I see many unhappy Aero customers waiting forever for random products, but FFL stuff like lowers seem to be the worst. Idk what’s going on over there right now.

I forgot about that. One could just order from a vendor and not directly from Aero.

Aimsurplus is where I get my Aero stuff.

I've been buying the H&R retro lowers. Their quality is amazing.

They are spendy, but I buy for the rollmarks.

quote:

Originally posted by sigfreund:
Wilson Combat does have some receivers for not much more than $100 as well.

The Wilson AR15 that shot my 10-round group on 4/7/25 has a forged lower. My billet receiver group Wilsons might be a touch more accurate than my forged versions, but it's splitting hairs. The billet versions look nicer.

Wilson offers site-wide sales with 15-20% discounts a few times a year. If tradition holds, the next sales will likely occur just before Memorial Day weekend and the 4th of July.

quote:

Originally posted by fritz:
Wilson offers site-wide sales with 15-20% discounts a few times a year. If tradition holds, the next sales will likely occur just before Memorial Day weekend and the 4th of July.

That's good to know. I don't need to be in a rush (I believe), so can wait for best deals.

I have a Spike's with the red and white paint, which looks pretty cool. The night of the 2016 election, Cabela's was having a sale on Andersons, I think for $34.99 each. I was watching the election returns and though Hillary was going to win, decided to place an order for three. When I clicked to submit, it went to "page cannot be displayed." I figured I'd try again a bit. By then Trump was winning, so I blew it off. Three weeks later Cabela's called to say to come pick them up. So I did. I've only built up one of them so far. I came across a cool APF, the folding one a few mos. ago on sale and snagged it and built it up. It's my car trunk gun now.

To my mind, the only feature worth looking for is a nicely flared magwell on an AR lower. Outside of that, I don’t really think there’s much difference between the cheapest lower and any other one. Not really looking for an M16 lower as I don't have a registered sear.

I’ve got two at present. One is the Hydramatic one I posted earlier here, a M16A1 tribute, the other one a spare Anderson that will get made into a pistol, probably 300 Blackout.

I've got four in the bottom of my safe that have been there for over a year. One is an H&R M16E1 partial fence lower I bought for a GUU 5/P project that's been in limbo since forever, but the others were just some $40 PSA blems and a Ruger lower I inherited from my father that he never built out. I also have lower parts kits and everything I need to assemble them, I just haven't had a need or desire to. If I were going to stock some lowers now, I'd get some Geissele blem lowers on their next sales event.

was partial to Rock River and Eagle Arms back in the day,

now I am a Stocking Aero Dealer, barely, we don't order much from them, sales are off on the saturated AR market, and their dealer policies on pricing is extremely inconsistent

Aero makes good stuff, tho


having said that,
I have Sendra, Eagle, RRA, LRB, Aero and Bushmaster lowers on various builds, and all what they are supposed to do,


FWIW, I think there are only a handful of forgers/casting houses out there, and they make the recievers for a lot of different folks,

LMT is one, Aero and PSA may be some of the others

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:

quote:

Originally posted by SigSauerP226:
I don’t know if I could recommend Aero right now, I’m still waiting on a stripped lower bought on Black Friday. LGS didn’t have any in stock and ordered one for me. Called a couple times and order hasn’t been processed by Aero. Google the shit and I see many unhappy Aero customers waiting forever for random products, but FFL stuff like lowers seem to be the worst. Idk what’s going on over there right now.

I forgot about that. One could just order from a vendor and not directly from Aero.

Aimsurplus is where I get my Aero stuff.

I usually would order through a vendor but my usual LGS I use for transfers has a $75 fee per firearm so I tried to just buy one from a LGS, but didn’t find one in stock. I had no clue it would take this long, he had mentioned waits of up to two weeks is normal with Aero. I’m not in a rush but at this point I might just cancel…

PSA has 3 Stealth (no roll mark) lowers for $120
https://palmettostatearmory.co...retail_inventory_tab