Day 510

When the alarm went off I turned over and went back to sleep for half an hour.  Then I surfed for a little time.  I didn't stay in bed long because I wanted to work on the RRA.

After the pet stuff and breakfast I did a little surfing.  I went out to the garage a little before 10. I found out last night that I'd been turning the lock ring the wrong way.  So I got out the heat gun and heated the crap out of the ring.  Then I tried to turn it off.  It didn't work.  I spent over an hour heating and trying to turn it.  It didn't work.

In retrospect I think one of the problems was that the wrench I had was a little too small.  A larger one might have gripped the ring better and given me more leverage.  Also I might have been successful if I'd used a screwdriver and hammer to back it out.  Oh well.

What I did do was get out the dremel and cut off the ring.  I did it carefully and just barely made a mark on the barrel nut.  It probably doesn't matter since I don't see every using the old hand guard.  It's big, clunky, heavy, and short.  The hand guard unscrewed easily and the barrel nut came off with a little heat and using the torque wrench for leverage.

I decided to use the PA hand guard.  The barrel nut wouldn't fit in it because the mounting screw holes had burrs.  I filed them down and then it fit well.  At least it did until I screwed up.  As I was doing the "stretching" tightening/loosening wrenching the wrench slipped and munged up the barrel nut.  I spent quite a bit of time filing the rough spots to get it to fit the hand guard again.  It ended up tight, needing to be pounded on.

Putting the barrel nut on was a pain.  I just couldn't get it timed.  I had to get out my spare shims from my parts box.  The ones that came with the hand guard weren't enough.  Once I did that things got easier.  The gas block went on easily.  The hand guard went on pretty easily, but I had to us a hammer to get it on the last half inch.  The muzzle device wasn't hard either.

After that I did my exercises and then went back to the house.  We packed up the cats and went to Dripping Springs with the dog.  The first stop was HEB for some groceries.  Then we went to the sub shop next door for lunch.  After that we took the dog to the park where she did 34 retrieves.  The last stop was Tractor Supply for 100 lbs of bird seed.

When we got home I surfed for a little while and then took the dog to the mail box.  The evening was watching the gun shows.