Completed my 2nd AR15 lower build today.

[jblomenberg16]

Finished up my 2nd build this evening. My first was building up a S&W M&P15 lower. I was amazed how easy it was, so convinced myself to do another once funds allowed. I picked up a YHM lower from the good folks at Acme Sports today, and had been slowly acquiring the other necessary parts to finish a lower.

Finish on the YHM was very nice, and the forging and machining looked very good. I'd say the color is just a slight more gray than true black, but definitely darker than the S&W I have, and doesn't have any purple tint to it. On this particular lower, there is a small indentation on the right side just below the edge that meets the upper, just behind the mag release and above the hammer pin hole. It looks like it might be from the forging process. All in all, it appears to be a decent lower for the money, which was priced locally somewhere in the middle of the less expensive lowers like Doublestar, R-Guns, etc. and the higher priced Bushmaster, Spikes, and the like.

A couple of things I noted about this second build:

1st, the dentent springs in the unmarked LPK I had seemed to be about 2 coils to long, and/or, the hole in the reciever for the pivot pin dentent spring was a bit too shallow. The spring would be compressed to solid length and the detent was sticking out to far to insert the pivot pin (sticking roughly 1/8 to 1/4 into the pin diameter). I don't have the right tool, but use the razor blade technique. I messed with it for about a half hour and had no luck. The first time I built a lower I breezed through this the first try using that method. I blew out the hole to make sure there weren't any chips in it, and after launching the detent pin across the room twice (luckily I found it both times), I resorted to cutting the two coils from one end. It went right together first try. The detent still provides plenty of resistance to keep the pivot pin in place.
*** As an aside, I had no problems with the rear detent, but that's a lot easier to put together.

2nd, my wife wasn't liking the sound of me pounding the role pins in the trigger guard and bolt release. Our daughter was taking a nap, and I would have to agree with my wife that waking her up would have been bad news (she's 2, and grumpy if she doesn't get her sleep!!). So, I decided to try the vice grip technique on the bolt catch role pin. Man, that was easier than I thought, and way easier to do it that way than trying to drive it home with a roll pin punch. I taped up the jaws on the vice grip so as not to scratch the lower, and gentley squeezed the pin home. I'll definitely do it again that way on my next build. Instructions on how to use that method are in one of the ARFCOM sticky threads.

Once I get a few pics tomorrow in the daylight, I'll post them up.