Some of you may not know but the AR-18 was not the first stamped steel rifle that Armalite made, that distinction goes to the AR-16.
This gun was also the last gun designed by Eugene Stoner before he left Armalite. That’s right, he was not one of the designers of the AR-18 as many have maintained.
First a little background.
Armalite never wanted to be in the business of building weapons but rather to design them and license the manufacturing to someone else. After selling the patents for the AR-10 and AR-15 outright to Colt’s, they quickly determined that they needed another design to license but it could not use the direct impingement system that they no longer held the rights to. They also decided to design a weapon that could be built on machines that required less skilled labor and fewer machining operations.
This lead to the AR-16 with only the bolt and trunion requiring complex and skilled machining operations.
Only three guns were reportedly built and only two known today. Both in the possession of Knights Armament.
Thanks to my good friend Chuck over at GunLab.net ,who actually took these photographs, we can show you an up close look at these fine weapons.
I think it is easy to see the family resemblance to the AR-18.
