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Springfield Hellion - 5.56 Bullpup Service Rifle Review
Updated
22 months ago
Most of us are interested in something different. Different always catches our attention for whatever reason. Now, the Bullpup time! The bullpup design is nothing new, but it's different. And new have managed to make it work or put it into production. IWI was one of the first to be really successful with their Tavor, there's just not a lot of options out there until now. Springfield's just released their version of the 5.56 Hellion Bullpup and it looks very different and it grabs one's attention. Only real question is - how does it perform? Let's find out and review the Hellion. Check this out!
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So this is it - the Hellion. It looks pretty darn cool, so much, so that it actually got my son interested in shooting again with me. That's a huge bonus. Let's just take a quick look at the specs and tech, and then up close, and check out all the features that this has before we start shooting.
Springfield Hellion Specs
- 5.56/.223
- 8 lbs
- 5-Position Adjustable Stock w/Cheek Riser
- 16" CMV, Melonite 1:7 Hammer Forged Barrel
- 2-Position Adjustable, Short Stroke Piston
- Length 28.25" - 29.75"
- Integrated Flip-up Front Sight, Elevation Adjustable
- Integrated Flip-up Rear Sight w/5-Position Aperture, Windage Adjustable
- Polymer, M-Lok Handguard
- Ambi, Non-Reciprocating Charging handle
- Ambi Safety Switch
- Ambi Ejection System
- BCM Gunfigter MOD 3 Grip
So, disassembly is pretty easy to get the Bolt Carrier group out. We've got a pin here, and we can just push that down, and then pull out, and this back part comes off, and it just slides out. Can disassemble the bolt easily and put it back in.
I have the receiver open. One thing I wanted to note is - this is non-reciprocating, so with it open to release the bolt carrier group forward, you've just got these here. That's the part that moves, this part doesn't move, so just squeeze, and it goes forward. Mag release, I guess you could call ambidextrous because it's right here on the back. We just pinched that. I have noticed - it's a pretty tight fit. The mags don't just readily fall out. Okay, and sometimes you gotta squeeze that a bit hard. Okay, once this back portion comes off, we have the trigger group in here and that comes out. The instructions say that you can take that out and clean it as is that you don't need to further disassemble that.
Up here and I've got it blocked. Okay, there's a little button here, and we can push that and then the rear sights flip up. They're really nice iron sights. I did not use them just because my vision is getting such to the point where I can't see the front post anymore.
And you have to push that button down, and the front sight goes down on both sides. We also have a clip here for a sling if we want to remove the front end to get the barrel or remove this top rail. This one here pushes in, pulls out and then all of this just slides off that. You have an adjustable gas block. You can turn it with your fingers. This just pushes in, and then it twists. So we've essentially got suppressed and unsuppressed.
That got my attention - looks cool, feels cool, it's different. Let's just see how it performs. I'm going to start off shooting with a red dot, and then I'm going to move to this scope. So, the initial shooting was done with a Holosun AEMS Core that I was reviewing, and you can check out that review separately for more information on the AEMS.
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HOLOSUN AEMS CORE Reflex Sight
$299.99
Bass Pro Shops
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HOLOSUN AEMS CORE Reflex Sight
$299.99
Cabela's
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Holosun Aems, Holosun Aems-core-110101 Adv Enclosd Micro Sgt Red
$299.99
Firearms Depot
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Holosun AEMS-CORE-110101 Red 2MOA Dot Cast Aluminum Enclosed Shake Awake Rifle
$299.99
TheGunDock.com
and 29 more stores
AEMSCORE110101
810047071235
Holosun AEMS-CORE-120101 Green 2MOA Dot Cast Aluminum Enclosed Shake Awake Rifle
$314.99
TheGunDock.com
and 31 more stores
AEMSCORE120101
810047071556
Holosun Aems, Holosun Aems-core-120101 Adv Enclosd Micro Sgt Grn
$314.99
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AEMSCORE120101
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We've got a 30 round mag here, this is what we're gonna use, it's been working fantastic so far. It's real quick I tossed on Holosun's three times magnifier, lines up very nicely. We're gonna get this zeroed at 50. Gonna bring on some hundred, 200, 300. We'll see how far we can go. We can go all the way up to 500. Let's see what we can do with this Holosun combination. We'll do it both with and without the magnifier.
Special thanks to Remington for providing the ammo for this review. This is the 50-grain jacketed hollow point. This is some fast stuff, so I've had some good luck with this. Let's see how we can do. Just real quick here - sighting in at 50 yards. We are using the magnifier, we're using the Remington, let's take a look. Pretty happy with that guys. Okay - the first shot was down here, the second shot over-adjusted just a little bit, brought down the fourth shot. I want to put some paper up at a hundred because I want to zero this one at a hundred, and then it will start banging some steel.
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Just so you can see what I'm looking at here, my sight picture. So this is what I'm looking at a hundred yards with a magnifier. After getting it zeroed, then at 50 and then coming down here to a 100. I started up here, and then I kind of moved...actually I had one, two, three and then I moved over, and I made just a couple more clicks here. I still, I think I put a couple there. I want to try a couple more and try to get it right here before we go to steel, so we can really reach out at some distance. Okay, so I was getting some nice groups at a hundred yards. I'm satisfied, you know, especially with a red dot and a magnifier, you know. I'm going to fire off a couple at 200 just because I'm starting to run low on ammo, and then we're going to go 300. We'll give it a shot at 400, and hitting steel on all those, and we're gonna take this off and torture test it.
That worked. Let's go three (hundred). Okay, not too challenging, let's give it a shot at four (hundred). Nice... Nice... All right!
Hey guys, sorry about the wind. You gotta love living in Nebraska. Yesterday, when I was doing the initial review, it was 70 degrees. Now it is negative, negative 20 with the windchill, so this is going to be fast. We torture tested it, got it back on, been waiting all day for the wind to die down. Did not do anything with it other than put it back on. Let's see if we can bang 2, 3, and 4 hundred like we did yesterday. And I don't have long before my fingers are gonna freeze off. We'll start here at 200. Yep... let's go three.
Before I run out of this Remington ammo, which is what I have this optic on, I want to see how I can do out there at a 100, 200, maybe 300 standing, then what I'm gonna do is I'm going to switch optics, I want to see what kind of accuracy we can get, so then I'm going to take these off, and I'm going to throw, I can't remember if it's a one to six or a one to eight power with a BDC and some match ammo, and see what we can do with that anyway. Let's just see what I can get here. Let's go 200.
After I seasoned the barrel a bit, I moved to the scope, now I want to test its accuracy using some different ammo and see how it does with the different loads behind me here at 100 yards.
Getting it zeroed at 100 yards using the Hornady frontier. Yeah, we got some, some decent group. It's all kind of the same. I had a shot here, here, and then I dialed it up and I think I got here. And then I just left it where it was at. I mean, it's got a long, creepy, mushy pull. You know, it's a bullpup, you know, if I had a match-grade trigger in there, I'm sure I could shrink those groups. You know, it's also, it's awesome platform for standing, but it isn't the most conducive to benching like a more traditional rifle, so we'll try some different loads here, see if we can shrink that down, see if it spreads out, we'll see if we can find what it likes best.
I've been shooting, you know, I just, I like a 10 rounder, I've got an Amend2 10 rounder here, it's working great so far. In my standing videos, I was using the Amend2 30 round and just saw an awesome deal at Joe Bob's for $7.99 for the 30 round mags. You know, so that's actually a pretty decent group using that Remington. It seems to like that a little bit better. Let's go the other direction, let's try some havier, maybe some 75 grain, some Hornady, some PPU.
Yes, that's not a bad grouping with the IMI. It's not necessarily a whole lot better than the 50 grain which is interesting.
There's the Hornady 75 green, I only had 5 shots left in that box. Unfortunately, yeah, it wasn't looking like it was maybe going to be a super good group. okay, this is that PPU, now I've had very consistent luck with this over the years, you know. I gotta say, I'm pretty happy with that group. That's looking like one of the best groups you know. The Remington, that wasn't too bad, that was the 50 grain, that was the IMI, that was the frontier 55-grain match, and the PPU.
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Special thanks to Winchester for providing some ammo here. We've got the green tip. Let's see how this does compared to what we've got so far.
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5.56x45 - 55 Grain FMJ - Winchester USA VALOR - 1250 Rounds
$700.00
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USA193125
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Winchester Ammo USA193125 USA Valor M193 5.56x45mm NATO, 55 gr Full Metal Jacket (FMJ) - 125RDS - VETERAN OWNED BUSINESS
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Winchester Ammo USA855125 USA Valor M855 Green Tip 5.56x45mm NATO 62 gr Full Metal Jacket 125 Per Box/ 10 Case
$80.28
Hinterland Outfitters
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Winchester USA Valor 5.56x45mm NATO Ammo 62 Grain Penetrator Full Metal Jacket Case of 1250 (10 Boxes of 125)
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MidwayUSA
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Winchester USA Valor M855 Green Tip Rifle Ammunition 5.56mm 62 gr. FMJ 3060 fps 125/ct
$89.99
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WNUSA855125
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Guys, I gotta say what I can see through the scope, um...that absolutely shocked me. I did not expect, but let's run down there and see if I'm actually seeing what I think I see. So, I just finished with the Winchester and I gotta say, that's, you know, an MOA group, but that's impressive. Considering we're using some match grade, you know, Sierra Boat King up here... Yeah... and it's group-wise, it's not necessarily tighter although at least from what I can see, I think that's the tightest group, but it's on, which means this is what I'm gonna use for my steel and the group is arguably probably one of the best.
Okay, I've got the Hellion here, I've got my shooting assistant Wyatt.
(Wyatt):"Hello!"
This is my 14-year-old son, yes, 6'4, no, obviously he didn't get it from me. He thinks that this thing looks super cool, yes, and we are excited to shoot it. So we're going to play, we'll start off here at a hundred standing, we'll go to 200, 300, we'll see what we could do. I'm not gonna lie to you why it's a pretty good shot. Six was when he got his first deer at about 170 yards, and also at six, he was actually able to hit the steel up there at 500. Um... I'm gonna say - yeah, he got that from me, so anyway, let's have some fun and see what a 14-year-old can do. Now buddy, send it when you're ready. Try the 100 yards without the magnifier.
There you go, nice, nice... now you got it. Send it when you're ready. Nice...Okay, we're gonna go for 300. Nice... Doing better at three (hundred). You're gonna try 400 using Rear Squeeze Bag. Nice...
We want to see how fast I can get these on target, I'm guessing probably pretty fast. All right, let's go for some of those small spinners. You'll be able to hear it if I hit it. Nice. Let's just see what we can do with this green tip here at 200. See how fast we can get these off, I'm guessing pretty fast. All right, let's try that at three (hundred). Wind's kind of picking up here, we're getting some gusts. I think it was blowing a few of those off. I think I'm gonna stop for now and wait for that wind to die down a little bit before we reach out. I'd like to do three (hundred) again with no wind and four (hundred) and five (hundred).
The wind died down a little bit here, let's give this a go at 300 again. Nice, okay, let's give her a go here at 400. Hm...my barrel's hot, I can tell you that much I can smell it. I'm gonna let it cool off, and we're gonna try five (hundred). Okay, let's give it a go here at 500. Got no wind, that shouldn't be a factor whatsoever here, we'll, uh...500 - seems to be pushing it either with the gun or ammo.
