Testing the Ruger SFAR

by Joe Gorman

Behold, the Ruger SFAR (small frame autoloading rifle). Ruger’s storied history of innovation continues with the arrival of a .308 AR in a 5.56mm AR frame. To say this rifle is a game changer is stating the obvious. After shooting the test sample 20”-barreled SFAR that Ruger sent us, going back to my SIG 716 Patrol was a disappointment. In fairness the SIG716 is incredibly reliable and also a 1.5 MOA rifle. Compared to the smaller size and better balance of the svelte Ruger, the 716 seemed clunky and awkward.

At first glance you might think the Ruger SFAR is merely an AR lower with an enlarged magwell. There is more to it than that. Dimensionally the SFAR is very close to a standard 5.56mm AR15. Upon field stripping the SFAR, you’ll notice the bolt carrier, barrel extension and some other critical sizes are a bit different. While you can use a standard AR trigger group, you can’t throw in a regular AR bolt carrier or us a standard AR barrel. Ruger’s use of modern metals and clever engineering has allowed them to create a 7 pound .308 AR that is affordable and accurate enough to hit a hog where you want to at 400 yards.

The stock trigger in the SFAR is worth mentioning. It is superior to any service AR trigger I’ve experienced. I got it to break just under 5 pounds and cleanly. Excellent work Ruger engineers! You don’t really need to change out the trigger. But I, of course, changed out the trigger for a Timney drop in, flat trigger shoe. This dropped the break weight to just under 4 pounds and offers zero mush/grit/play etc. For offhanded shooting and hunting,

Timney Impact Drop-In Trigger. In five minutes you can have a great trigger for a very reasonable price

I mounted the new Burris XTR III 3.3-18x non-illuminated glass to assess the accuracy of the rifle. This new Burris glass is world-class-clear to my eyes and remains reasonably priced. I can turn the elevation and windage turrets all day long and can rest assured that when I roll them back to zero, I’ll be right where I was when I started.

At the first bench session with the SFAR, I instantly noticed it had soft recoil relative to other .308s in the safe. I attribute this to the Howitzer-style muzzle brake on the SFAR. Alas, in physics there is no free lunch and this rifle is crazy loud: plugs and muffs loud. I’ll take this trade off any day. After a couple hundred rounds with the gas block set to position 3, I moved the block adjustment to position 2. I experienced a couple failures to hold the bolt back on the last round but this quickly worked itself out and the rifle began running well and never had a problem again. Not being one to leave well enough alone, I also replaced the stock gas block with the Superlative Arms .750” adjustable, D.I. gas block. Ruger’s gas block is beefy and well-made but the Superlative Arms block allows way more resolution of gas adjustment. The smaller Superlative Arms gas block also eliminates the possibility that the block will contact the handguards under recoil. There is plenty of adjustment in the Superlative Arms gas block to get to the sweet spot of ejection for any ammunition you wish to run.

Left Photo: The .750 Superlative Arms adjustable gas block on the left and the factory Ruger gas block on the right.

Right Photo: The Superlative Arms adjustable gas block mounted and showing lots of space around it in the Ruger hand-gard.

I fired surplus 147gr military ammunition through the rifle to break it in and adjust the new gas block (there is provision in the pistol grip to store the hex key that adjusts the gas block which is very handy. Yes, I said handy).

Moving on to accuracy testing, I cycled though our on-hand collection of premium .308 ammunition to test the potential of the SFAR. As I expected all the Hornady 168gr match ammo averaged 5-shot groups at 100 yards between 1.3-1.5 MOA (Hornady 168gr BTHP, 168gr ELD MATCH, 168gr ELD Superformance, 168gr AMAX were tested). I also used the tried and true Federal 168gr BTHP Gold Medal and it acquitted itself quite well. The Federal Gold Medal turned in an average 5-round group size of 1.5 MOA too. I had a couple hundred rounds of 147gr German mil ball, made by M.E.N., and surprisingly it shot only slightly larger groups, averaging 1.65 MOA. I can’t find this ammunition anymore online, but if it’s ever available again, it would be worth stocking up on.

I took the SFAR with me when I traveled to western South Dakota and I also took an old water filter to shoot. Because that’s what people do. It was roughly 3” in diameter and a foot tall and I thought, “this would be great to stand up out in the middle of range land and shoot it.” With Hornady 168gr ELD Match ammo, I managed to hit the filter from 600 yards out on the third shot. As usual, doping the wind was the trickiest part of that shot.

To wrap up, this rifle is great out of the box. It’s a little over a grand out on Huggy Bear’s street and accurate enough that you can kill a regular orange at 100 yards with ammunition it likes 5 out of 5 times. Attach some glass that suits the mission at hand and just run it. It’s also flat out fun to shoot. The physics experiment on the end of the barrel retains just enough kick that you know this isn’t a 5.56 but it truthfully doesn’t feel like .308!

Ultimately, I settled on mounting my old Trijicon ACOG TA31 on the SFAR. I’ve accepted the fact that it’s not a precision rifle, it’s an accurate battle rifle. With the ACOG mounted, it’s light and handy in a way that it’s just not with heavier glass on it. I figure with a magazine full of Hornady 168gr AMAX and an ACOG on the SFAR, any Texas hog I see is a goner.