At least in 22lr you could afford to shoot it more than once a year!
I was at the range one day and a guy I'd never met pulled what I thought was an HK 21 out of the back of his Jeep ... of course I had to meet him; I introduced myself; he was impressed that I knew what it was (not many people at our range have an interest in anything except wood guns and pretty basic AR's.)
I was wrong by a bit, as it was an HK23e (almost the same thing but 223). We hit it off well and he let me shoot it, but he didn't have a sear pack, a couple weeks later we shot it with my pack at another friends farm.
Needless to say, I was in love, but when it came right down to it I was having a hard time in parting with the $15-$18K to procure semiauto clone that had a wait up to a year long. After a few months of shopping and wrestling with it, I went with an Ares Defense MCR beltfed upper.
I started with the "lite" package which has a medium contour 16" barrel. As soon as I could scrape the $$$ together I added the 12" machine gun barrel and full auto bolt carrier for use on my M16 ... When I was "happy" I had spent about 1/4th the cost of the HK23e ... Although with the 23e I could have added a 308 barrel & feed tray, but that would have added another $2,500 to the price :bang
The MCR does a great job of scratching the belt-fed itch :devil
This is an old video (click on the picture) that will be going away soon as it's on a photobucket account, but IIRC it should be good until November 15th ... I suppose I can add it to my you-tube account.
If you're at a gunshow and you see an Ares Defense beltfed upper with a Spikes "Snowflake" lower, be sure and say "HI" ... I don't put it up for public display with the M16 lower. This lower is a pic I captured off GunBroker; mine has the unicorn painted in with pink & white & a rainbow off the shooting star ... It doesn't show it but the safety positions are
"Safe Space, Triggered & Full Libtard" ... When I saw it I had to laugh ... and buy one!
