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The Best Budget Barrel?? - Anderson 14.5 inches
Updated
29 months ago
Good morning, everyone, this is John with gun.deals, today we're going to be taking a look at one of the highest performance-per-dollar barrels on the market, and that's not because the performance is the highest but because the dollars are basically the lowest, this is the Anderson 14.5.
Full disclosure on this barrel is that I have absolutely no relationship with Anderson whatsoever and I paid my own money for it, which was I think $54.
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Getting into specifics on this barrel, this is a 14.5 mid-length gas system 4150 chrome moly vanadium steel, this version is the nitride version, though I believe they also make a phosphate chrome that is a little bit more expensive, this is usually the cheaper version, though that's really the only difference between the two barrels as far as I can tell. It is a 5.56 chambering with a 1:7 twist, half by 28 threads at the end with a 11-degree target crown, and very importantly the barrel is dimpled, which is something that I personally really like to see. I don't buy build or sell anything that doesn't have either a dimple or a pin of some sort to hold that gas block in place because too many times, especially on cheaper components, cheaper builds, I've had at least a half dozen gas blocks at this point walk free. With a dimple, even if it does loosen up a little bit, it's still going to stay in the same spot.
The profile is listed as a Government profile, which a lot of people aren't going to like. However, it's just incorrect, it's not a Government profile, normally a Government profile has a much thinner taper in the back between the chamber and the gas block, I forget the exact measurement, something like .625, .65, somewhere in that region. This has a much heavier section in the back something like .750, and then your .750 gas block journal, and then basically a straight profile to your threads. That is much more of a middleweight profile where a Government would still have the heavier section out front, but then would have a very thin taper in the middle, which is not quite as weight-efficient and is not going to balance quite as well as other systems, though a Government profile barrel does still work, and for some reason they tend to be accurate as well. This is one step above a government profile in terms of weight because that initial section in between the chamber and the gas block is a little bit heavier.
One of the things that I see a lot on cheap barrels, and it's kind of a downside of a lot of more budget-end barrels, is that they make their gas ports very large so that they will cycle a wide variety of ammo. Basically, no matter how the end user screws up their gas block, gas tube, super heavy buffers, really crappy ammo, the thing is going to run because they've over gassed it from the factory by enlarging that gas port. This is a 14.5 mid-length system and I was very surprised to see a .075 gas port size. Usually, a 14.5 mid is somewhere between .078 and .081, that is where most 14.5 mids are going to be, and that will eject decent ammunition with carbine springs and buffers at about 3 o’clock, somewhere between 2 and 3 o’clock, depending on your specific ammo, circumstances, so on and so forth. However, I was very surprised to see a gas port all the way down at .075, that is very well gassed from the factory for high quality ammunition and carbine springs and buffers.
For a separate review that I'll be doing in the future I did butcher this gas support size, I actually did open it up to a .081, which is over gassed for carbine springs, buffers, and especially when we throw a suppressor in the mix, but I do want to note that from the factory this is actually a very well gassed barrel, you're using at least decent quality ammunition, and you're not running some absurdly heavy buffer and spring combo.
Reliability was 100%, I never had any issues with the barrel, anything else like that M4 feed ramps in the extension, all the machining looks fine to the naked eye, I did not run like a bore scope through it or anything else like that, and it did run 100%. Performance was very good, gassing was very good, reliability was fine so far, we are going to be putting more rounds on it on the future, but when we get to accuracy this is one of those areas where that little bit heavier of a profile seemed to help out quite a bit. Just using a red dot and magnifier combo, this is the Sig Romeo 8T and this is a Northtac Ronin 3X magnifier, so this was the optic combo for doing the accuracy testing on this build, so keep that in mind, a little bit more magnification probably would have helped me refine my point of aim and shrink those groups down just a little bit.
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Starting off with five rounds of Armscor 55 grain, kind of an M193, not really, that one there did about 3 to four MOA out of this barrel, which is perfectly fine for mediocre Ball ammo, it's not even what I would consider to be good Ball ammunition. Next up moving to some very heavy 77 grain Sig Marksman OTM ammunition, I should note that in every single gun that I've shot this sig Marksman ammo through it has shot MOA or better, and the Anderson 14.5 was no different, putting five rounds basically in the same hole, keep in mind I'm just using a red dot and 3x magnifier.
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Then moving on to some 73 grain, which was a Hornady Super Performance, one of their Match loads, that one did a little bit worse, it basically had one flyer just a little bit to the left, still a very good group, about 1/2 MOA or so. When using Match ammunition, yes, the barrel is about 1 ounce heavier, maybe 2 ounces heavier than like a standard Government profile, it is certainly a middleweight profile, but it does have very good accuracy characteristics with the heavier loads, 1:7 twist, it matches up really well, and for the price, pretty fantastic.
The performance is actually good on paper, I don't have anything wrong with it, this is just a sample size of one so something that is probably worse is going to be like QC. It does come with a lifetime warranty, which is nice, so even if you do have an issue they will hopefully eventually resolve it for you, but with this example, perfectly fine, from the factory, no issues whatsoever, and I paid $54 for it. In fact this is one of, if not the cheapest barrels on the market on sale, Primary Arms did have it on sale even cheaper, I believe it was $40 on sale, which is absolutely crazy. Currently, it is $70 at Daytona Tactical, and I think MSRP is like only 115 bucks, so if you find it anywhere for a reasonable price it's going to be well under $100, and it performs like a mid-priced barrel, but it's one of the cheapest barrels on the market.
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When it comes to the barrel’s raw performance I have almost nothing to complain about, it's accurate enough, the profile is a middleweight profile which I personally like, dimpled from the factory, properly set up gas port, the machining and everything else works so far, no issues, no obstructions or anything else like that, and when you consider the price-to-performance, well, it might be one of the best on the market just by virtue of having decent performance or even what I would consider to be good performance, and the lowest price on the market basically. That is about all that I have on the Anderson 14.5.
