Originally published at Notes From The Bunker. You can comment here or there.

One of the ‘home defense’ guns we keep around is an AR carbine. Why not, y’know? If something goes thump in the night you may as well respond to it with an overwhelming advantage. Since it’s presumed that most bad things happen at night, it’s a Bushy Dissipator that had a cheesy clamp-on plastic bracket to allow me to affix a Surefire Scout light to the side of the A2-style forend. It works, but it’s a little ghetto and not as high-quality and efficient as I’d like.

So, I picked up the SureFire Millennium the other day and I figured I may as well upgrade the carbine. I’ll rotate the older parts down to some of the standyby/backup ARs. Problem was, the usual A2 handguard doesnt have any mounting points for, well, anything. So I trekked back to the gun show and picked up a Magpul MOE rifle-length forend and a section of long rail to mount to it. (And, let me say, I freakin’ hate removing AR handguards. I can think of no other rifle that makes removing the handguards such a tremendous pain in the ass.) While I was there, I also picked up the Magpul illumination kit. See, normally you just rubber band/velcro/tape your lights tape switch to the handguard. It works, but it isnt neat and tidy. This little kit makes the tape switch into an integral part of the forend.

TPIWWP, so:

Although, really, most of the time I’ll pick up the G19 w/ tactical light if I have to go investigate something…but it’s nice to have options. I suppose its the difference between investigating something going ‘thump’ and something going ‘THUMP!’. (Like, say, the sound of car doors slamming and multiple sets of feet storming up the porch steps…at which point, yeah, the G19 would probably get passed over for the AR. [although the tweaked out 870 might come to hand.])

Anyway, it was a pleasant enough gun show and it gave me the chance to do some upgrades, so I’m pleased.