I’ll toss in my $.02 here since I’ve built quite a few Grendels for kids over the last few years. What I’ve learned is that weight is everything and barrel length is always a problem (easier to handle a shorter gun and weight at that end of the gun is double bad when shooting). For those reasons, I always lean toward a pistol build (when/if legal) or a 14.5 with a pinned brake (brakes are always good for kids).
Here is what I put together for my son when he was 5 years old (AR-15 platform pistol);
Lower:
- Shockwave Blade (with added sling cup), there are even lighter & more compact options on the market now. Find something that is light and comfortable and go with that. I like the Shockwave because I could “fix” the length to fit my son and he wasn’t going to “bump” it out of adjustment.
- AR Gold Trigger tuned at 3.75 lbs, yep, I put a crisp trigger in the gun and adjusted it to be lighter than a “stock” single-stage. I found that a mil-spec trigger was too heavy for him so we played w/the trigger until we found something that worked for him. Blake has always been fantastic about trigger discipline so I wouldn’t have had any concerns going even lighter. YMMV so do what is SAFEST in your situation.
- Hogue rubber grip, I grabbed this out of the parts box so I’m not even sure that they still make it. I needed something smaller than a MagPul MAID/MOE and he liked the feel of this one a lot more than a standard A2. Like the trigger/brace, just find something that he’s comfortable holding and can reach the trigger without twisting his wrist.
- The rest of the lower was essentially “standard”. To keep it a touch lighter though, I only loaded 4-5 rounds in his magazine though. Over the course of a hunt, even a little bit of weight adds up (on this particular hunt, Blake only needed 1 round anyway. He has a way of making his dad proud, even then).
Upper:
- BCM upper, no frills.
- Free float tube, I don’t recall exactly what I went with but I do remember it was one of the lightest that I could find at the time, I also went with a shorter tube that I would have used normally (7” instead of 9”
. Like the lower, I wanted to cut some weight. There are TONS of options out there right now so I won’t even make a suggestion here (unless you want me to).
- 10.5” AA barrel, these were made of unobtainium at the time but, being an AA dealer, I pressed a few buttons and made it happen. If I were going to build him a new one today, I’d stick w/the 10.5” but use one of the group buy Lilja barrels. Full disclosure; I’m running that group buy and will be building Blake a new pistol using one of those barrels once I have all the customer barrels/builds completed and shipped, he’s 9 now so we may use a 12.5” instead of a 10.5” this time around, I’ll leave that up to him.
- APA G2 Little Bastard MB, this is one of the best MBs that I’ve used and, despite the fact that it’s a little heavier than others, proved to be a nice benefit to Blake’s build. Anything to reduce recoil is always a win for kids. For this reason you may want an adjustable gas system too (I tuned Blake’s gun the old fashioned way, with springs and buffer weights but adj gas is certainly the better way to go). Back to MBs, a VP6 would be a good option as well and is much lighter. That’s what I’ll be using on his new build.
Optics:
- Vortex Venom MRD in a QD mount. Accurate, easy to use and super light weight. What more could you want?
- 1.75-6x32mm Leupold VX-3 in a QD mount. I wanted to have various sighting options depending on the task. I had this VX-3 in the safe so we gave it a go. The lower power range and lower (relative) weight turned out to be a winner. Blake’s next gun is getting a Vortex Razor HD LH 1.5-8x32mm. A little extra power coupled w/the BDC gives him a little extra range out of a short gun w/out having to think about adjusting turrets (at this point he’s more than capable of adjusting turrets but less to do/think about in the field is always a win - side note, he shoots long range with a S&B PMII Ultra Short 3-20x50mm MRAD w/H59 reticle so twisting turrets isn’t exactly a foreign concept to him, he doesn’t want to carry something like that around all day though either).
- MagPul MBUS sights. These come and go, usually with the Venom. He can use them when/if needed. With the reliability of the newer optics (MRDs included), BUIS isn’t totally necessary but it’s important to me that my son knows how to use them anyway.
Extras:
- LaRue padded sling, I can easily/quickly adjust this to work for either Blake or myself. QD cups make this an easy on/off as well. If my selected free float tube doesn’t have a QD socket, I find a way to get one attached.
- Nothing else really, Blake carries a single mag in the gun, I keep the reloads on me. Now that he’s getting bigger, he’ll probably start carrying a single reload. He’s pretty proficient and very safe when it comes to clearing any possible malfunction and, without a mag on him, this option is out the window. If we’re going to potentially swap out his sights/optics in the field, I’ll carry that with me but generally the “extras” stay in the truck.
The trick w/kids is keep the weight down in whatever way you can. Less recoil is also better since you want them to regularly practice with them and be comfortable shooting. I had nearly identical builds in .22 and .223 that Blake could practice with when he young which helped quite a bit. He needs to be comfortable on the gun though. When I started Blake off shooting the full 6.5 loads, I’d have him work from a Lead Sled the majority of the time. As he’s gotten older, we’ve used the sled quite a bit less.
Good luck and great choice going w/the Grendel. It’s proven to be a winner with younger shooters, at least for me.
