In April of 2015 Ruger announced that the Mini-14 rifle would be available in AAC 300 Blackout.
And, yeah, even though it’s been largely ignored, it is sort of a big deal…
Since the 1980s the mini-14 has been the “go-to” semi-auto for all those who have wanted a rifle chambered for the US/NATO standard military round, but did NOT care for the M16/M4 family of rifles…. and there are a lot of such folk. It’s basically the venerable, indestructible Garand action of the M1 or M1 carbine or M14 with a few improvements. It is IMMENSELY popular, has been for something like 30 years, and it’s one of those firearms for which there are seemingly endless accessories and gadgets to customize it any way you like.
Technically, the mini-14 has only been available in that one round, the standard 5.56/.223. A long time back they came out with a “mini-30” variant that shoots the standard 7.62×39 AK47 round, for those who want one for Red Dawn scenarios, or just felt that their choice was better than ours (probably).
The thing is, the AAC 300 Blackout round has been eyed a lot as a possible official replacement for the 5.56. I know of no official response yet, but it’s basically come from the commercial world as an easy-migration-path alternative round for those who don’t like the 5.56. What it is, more or less, is a standard 5.56 round from the taper back, necked for a 30 caliber bullet instead of the basically 22 caliber current standard… and that means that most “AR” type rifles can be altered to shoot this round with just a barrel change.. same magazines, bolt, bolt carrier, gas mechanism, everything. A lot of “AR” guys run more than one upper receiver for a rifle anyway, and can uppers in a couple of minutes in the field. Any “AR” rifle manufacturer, or any military, can switch from 5.56 to AAC 300 with really minimal cost.
Better ballistics, better range, more knock-down power. It’s not a .308/7.62×51, but I’d much rather have this round for bad times than the current military standard.
So, there’s been considerable excitement about the round, and you can now get a lot of AR-type rifles chambered for it, and barrels, but the big question in everyone’s mind has been, is it going to take off, or just be another of the hundreds of new rounds that have come and gone, never really getting any traction in the marketplace?
And I think that’s just been answered. This is only the third chambering that’s been available for the Ruger mini family in like 30 years, and the first that is NOT one of the two most popular official military rounds on Earth. Now you have the “AR” family available in AAC 300, AND the most popular alternative to the AR family as well. This is going to make it much, much harder for the military to ignore… and I rather imagine the Marines, having gone back to the 1911 already, are very interested in this development. In doing this, Ruger has single-handedly pretty much insured that the round is here to stay, it’s not going anywhere… and that gives the green light for a lot more ammo manufacturers to start production…
… and, interestingly, they didn’t spawn a new name for this one. Whereas the version chambered for the AK became the “mini-30”, this is still being called the “mini-14″… so in that sense this is just the SECOND round available. It almost implies that they are EXPECTING this to eventually replace the 5.56 as a standard military round.
It may, MAY be that the commercial world will finally be able to put enough pressure on the military to reverse the “mouse gun” insanity that has been going on since the ’60s.
– Robert the Wombat