Furniture consists of a 6-position Magpul STR collapsible buttstock with enhanced cheek weld, twin tubular battery compartments, latch lock, rubber butt pad and dual QD sling swivel receptacles. A Magpul ASAP sling plate is mounted on the buffer tube at the aft end of the lower receiver, but we ended up forgoing this and using the buttstock’s integral QD mount out back, and a QD KeyMod attachment on the forend to mount our Blue Force Gear (blueforcegear.com) Vickers Padded sling in Kryptek Tyoon camo. The pistol grip is a textured rubber Ergo Grip with internal storage compartment. Our evaluation OPR-16 weighed 8 lbs. 13 oz. empty and without magazine or optics. It comes with one 20-round Magpul Gen M3 PMAG.
The rifle’s Geissele Super Dynamic Enhanced 2-stage trigger—which for our money is the best trigger you can put in any AR—deserves a paragraph of its own. The first-stage pull weight averaged 1 lb. 15 oz, and the second stage consistently measured an additional 1 lb. 0 oz., for a total average pull weight of 2 lbs. 15 oz. It exhibited absolutely zero creep, stacking or over travel—truly a world-class trigger that would set you back $250 if you bought it separately.
For reliabilty and function testing we installed a Nightforce NXS 1-4×24 Compact Riflescope in a Nightforce X-Treme Duty Ultralight Unimount on the top rail and layed down 200-plus rounds on steel-plate targets. Reliability was 100% with the new-manufacture 168 and 175-gr. loads, but spotty with some 20-plus-year old 147-gr. Military surplus ammo. We’re not sure if it was the aging ammo of overseas origin or if it was the gas-block setting, but lacking the time for a diagnosis, our money’s on the ammo.
To see what the OPR-16 was capable of at 100-yards from the bench, we removed the 1-4x Nightforce optic and replaced it with a 4-14x Nightforce SHV for a close up view of our targets. AR-10-style rifles have a reputation for producing outstanding downrange precision, so we were holding high hopes for the Daemon Defense. We weren’t dissapointed; using Black Hills’ 175-grain BTHP Match load—which also has a reputation for precision—we printed a 0.53” three-shot group, just barely missing the ½-MOA threshold. All other loads—ranging from 147 to 175-grains—were able to break the one-MOA mark, but the OPR-16 showed a distict prefference for this particular Black Hills load. Overall, we couldn’t ask for greater precision form a .30-cal. Defensive carbine.
Daemon Defense doesn’t publish a dealer list on their website yet, so you’ll have to call or e-mail them to find out where you can get your hands on an OPR-16. Contact Deamon Defense, LLC, Dept. OT; Tel.: (571) 234-1773; E-mail: [email protected]; Web: www.daemondefensellc.com
