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Benelli M4 -- Refinish Time!


StrangerDanger

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Time for something a little different. Put this one together for a guy. Built off of a factory 11791 dark earth model. Threw a whole slew of top shelf parts at it like;

OEM Collapsible Stock

Noveske/Limbsaver Buttpad

IWC MOE QD Sling Mount

FFT Trigger, painted black

FFT disconnector

FFT Wolff trigger pack spring kit

FFT OEM Reproduction handguards, black

DMW oversized safety, modified spring weight

TTI Shell Elevator, painted black

TTI stainless bolt knob, painted black

GG&G oversized bolt release

Carriercomp full length titanium dark earth magazine tube, Wolff Spring and Carriercomp Follower

Ava Tactical Mod 1 mount, painted dark earth

IWC M600 backbone light body painted dark earth

Surefire KE2-A 500 lumen output head, painted dark earth

Surefire Scout tailcap, machined to remove the shroud, then painted in dark earth (including the plastic locking ring)

Meprolight Night Sights, new front sight nut

Scalarworks top rail, painted dark earth

OEM aluminum trigger guard, painted dark earth

 

With this build, I swapped a lot of parts out that I have on hand that are NP3+ coated to add to the corrosion resistance, ease of cleaning, and smoothness of operation. While it's not as smooth as a full H2O Extreme build, it's pretty close. Parts that were visible from the exterior were then painted on just the visible areas. Such as the trigger, the shell release button and the shell elevator.

 

Some of the parts swapped out for NP3+ ones;

Trigger Pin

OEM Hammer

Hammer Spring Cap

TTI Shell Elevator

FFT Disconnector

Trigger Bushing

Safety Detent

Disconnector Plunger

Shell release button

Breech Latch Pin

Recoil Tube Plunger

Bolt

Extractor Claw

Extractor Claw Pin

Firing Pin

Firing Pin Retainer

Carriercomp Magazine Follower

Three piece front handguard retainer spring

 

I sent the aluminum trigger guard, the rear sight housing and elevation deck, front sight shroud, the aluminum portion of the collapsible stock, IWC MOE sling mount, the Ava Tactical light mount, IWC backbone light body, Surefire tailcap, Surefire KE2-A light head, rear handguard hanger and the Scalarworks top rail in to be painted in the dark earth color. I'm not a huge fan of the dark earth color, but overall it looks pretty awesome.

 

 

Doesn't the Noveske/Limbasaver Buttpad prevent the stock from fully collapsing? Or are you modifying them to make it work?

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  • 2 weeks later...
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Time for something a little different. Put this one together for a guy. Built off of a factory 11791 dark earth model. Threw a whole slew of top shelf parts at it like;

OEM Collapsible Stock

Noveske/Limbsaver Buttpad

 

 

Doesn't the Noveske/Limbasaver Buttpad prevent the stock from fully collapsing? Or are you modifying them to make it work?

 

Are you modifying the Noveske/Limbsaver Buttpads to allow the OEM collapsible stock to fully collapse? The factory Benelli buttpad has a hole on its backside to allow the stock to fully collapse. Are you somehow doing the same with the Noveske/Limbsaver?

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I modify the Limbsaver buttpad to allow the receiver extension to pass inside the buttpad. It's as simple as drilling out the approriate size hole in the buttpad. I modify the Noveske brackets by cutting them. The only parts needed are the ends with the additional mount positions. The single fastener is all that is needed to hold each end in place. Bolting the pad to the two pieces of the Noveske plate keeps everything rigid. Loctite all the things.

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I modify the Limbsaver buttpad to allow the receiver extension to pass inside the buttpad. It's as simple as drilling out the approriate size hole in the buttpad. I modify the Noveske brackets by cutting them. The only parts needed are the ends with the additional mount positions. The single fastener is all that is needed to hold each end in place. Bolting the pad to the two pieces of the Noveske plate keeps everything rigid. Loctite all the things.

 

Thanks for the detailed response.

 

That seems simple enough - I might go down this path too.

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  • 10 months later...

hRWXPRO.jpg

 

WVkS1rh.jpg

 

Added some new pictures to show the current changes to my original M4, 11703. Added a TangoArms set of stippled Freedom Fighter Tactical forearms. Swapped out my black type 1 RMR RM01 with a type 2 FDE Cerakote model RM06. I took the old black RMR over to a gen 5 Glock 34 I'm building up.

 

Scalarworks rail was swapped out with the Sync model. I had the visible portion of the shell elevator painted carbon black. The visible area of the Freedom Fighter Tactical trigger was painted in carbon black Cerakote. The Ava Tactical mod 1 mount was installed with a Surefire M600U 500 lumen output lamp on a IWC M600 body, and a Surefire Scout Light tailcap that I machined. The unit was then painted in burnt bronze Cerakote.

Edited by StrangerDanger
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Added some new pictures to show the current changes to my original M4, 11703. Added a TangoArms set of stippled Freedom Fighter Tactical forearms. Swapped out my black type 1 RMR RM01 with a type 2 FDE Cerakote model RM06. I took the old black RMR over to a gen 5 Glock 34 I'm building up.

 

Scalarworks rail was swapped out with the Sync model. I had the visible portion of the shell elevator painted carbon black. The visible area of the Freedom Fighter Tactical trigger was painted in carbon black Cerakote. The Ava Tactical mod 1 mount was installed with a Surefire M600U 500 lumen output lamp on a IWC M600 body, and a Surefire Scout Light tailcap that I machined. The unit was then painted in burnt bronze Cerakote.

 

 

Nicely done! I have a couple quick questions:

1. How is the traction of the forends you changed in relation to originals?

2. AVA Tactical mod 1 mount, I have the Doberman version, but looking at the flushness compared to your setup.

3. Your shell carrier looks different from my FFT with the structure at the end. Am I over analyzing it, or is yours different?

4. Rear sling attachement mount is made by who?

 

I really like the Cerakote work/contrast!

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Thanks. Hard to tell she has over 15k rounds through it.

 

1. The TangoDown stippling is really aggressive. Almost too aggressive. It feels like skateboard tape when you get it. After it tears up your hands some it looses its sharpness with what I imagine is a layer of dead skin. Either that or my hands got tougher.

 

2. Your Doberman is a lot bigger in diameter and has a much higher rated output. The IWC M600 Light body is perfect for the new Ava mount. One of the mounting lugs is held captive by the mount, so it cannot slip. I then machined the shroud off of the Surefire Scout Light tailcap to permit it to sit so close to the weapon. The light rides so tight that I cannot install the larger diameter Surefire M600 IB lamp I have unfortunately. Another future scalability issue is the newer Surefire lights with the rechargeable batteries require a larger diameter body. Not a lot, but noticeable. I’m curious to see how these work in this rendition of the mount. Since the new Surefires have a rated output of 1500 lumens. I need to see if IWC plans on making a replacement body for these.

 

3. The shell carrier is from TTI, but they are similar to the FFT. I have noticed some difference between the tips. Some have more curvature downward than others. I don’t have a preference for either one.

 

4. The sling mount is from IWC, it is a Magpul MOE QD socket that will fit through the existing sling loop without any modifications.

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Thanks. Hard to tell she has over 15k rounds through it.

 

1. The TangoDown stippling is really aggressive. Almost too aggressive. It feels like skateboard tape when you get it. After it tears up your hands some it looses its sharpness with what I imagine is a layer of dead skin. Either that or my hands got tougher.

 

2. Your Doberman is a lot bigger in diameter and has a much higher rated output. The IWC M600 Light body is perfect for the new Ava mount. One of the mounting lugs is held captive by the mount, so it cannot slip. I then machined the shroud off of the Surefire Scout Light tailcap to permit it to sit so close to the weapon. The light rides so tight that I cannot install the larger diameter Surefire M600 IB lamp I have unfortunately. Another future scalability issue is the newer Surefire lights with the rechargeable batteries require a larger diameter body. Not a lot, but noticeable. I’m curious to see how these work in this rendition of the mount. Since the new Surefires have a rated output of 1500 lumens. I need to see if IWC plans on making a replacement body for these.

I don't believe the new Scout heads differ in mating dimensions.

 

3. The shell carrier is from TTI, but they are similar to the FFT. I have noticed some difference between the tips. Some have more curvature downward than others. I don’t have a preference for either one.

 

4. The sling mount is from IWC, it is a Magpul MOE QD socket that will fit through the existing sling loop without any modifications.

 

I've been really liking the 500 lumen M300C.

 

In 15000 rounds, what has broken, and/or needed service or PM?

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I've found the longer the better for the light bodies on the M4, getting it closer to the muzzle reduces the amount of barrel shadow.

 

This started out as an old 11703 I bought in 2004. Within the first 50 rounds, I snapped one of the gas pistons due to the 4 port barrel. The M4 continued functioning with the snapped piston. The barrel beat the bolt carrier to death and deformed the face of the carrier to the point that it wouldn't cycle properly. So I sent it back to Benelli around 2008 and they gave me a 11707 barrel, new bolt carrier group, and handguards. I replaced the receiver extension with the 3 position unit around 2011. I had to replace the recoil spring at around the 7500 round mark. I should have replaced it earlier since it was causing malfunctions. I had replaced the springs in the trigger pack twice, they were starting to take a set and the pack seemed weak or anemic.

 

Since the big replacement items, I haven't noticed any wear that will cause further failures. Springs are always consumable.

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The Ava Tactical mod 1 mount was installed with a Surefire M600U 500 lumen output lamp on a IWC M600 body, and a Surefire Scout Light tailcap that I machined. The unit was then painted in burnt bronze Cerakote.

 

Hey SD,

What does the IWC body do for you? I have an Elzetta and am having issues with it. The Elzetta, as strong as it is, has a somewhat thin Tailcap. I think there may be some deformation under the AVA clamp that causes this light to not come on all the time unless I tweek on it a bit. It's also a bit short, so am looking at your surefire deployment here.

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The lug on the IWC body fits in the recess of the mod 1 perfectly. It’s also lighter than say a Surefire Scout Light body. The Surefire bodies need to be heavily modified to fit, where as this is a drop in unit. I use the IWC’s exclusiviely including on the AR platforms since the body offers fine tuning for shifting the light laterally in the mount to tighten it up against the firearm. This lateral adjustment doesn’t work when sticking it in the Ava mount, but it would if you were using the IWC light mount.

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This morning I took one of the Surefire M600IB 600 lumen output IntelliBeam lamps and stuck it in the lathe and machined off the high spots of the lamp to permit a tighter fit to the Benelli when using the Ava Tactical mount. Unfortunately you have to remove the the light from the mount in order to remove the head, but it does fit with the use of the IWC backbone body.

 

I'm going to order a couple more, then have them painted to hide the machining work.

 

It makes for swapping batteries to be kind of a pain, but I feel it is worth it for the IB technology.

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What a great thread, I finally finished reading it all.

 

Do you have pics of your light setup?

 

I'm wanting to get to an M4, had one sold it, but I'm curious about the collapsible stock compared to the straight stock. Big difference?

 

This morning I took one of the Surefire M600IB 600 lumen output IntelliBeam lamps and stuck it in the lathe and machined off the high spots of the lamp to permit a tighter fit to the Benelli when using the Ava Tactical mount. Unfortunately you have to remove the the light from the mount in order to remove the head, but it does fit with the use of the IWC backbone body.

 

I'm going to order a couple more, then have them painted to hide the machining work.

 

It makes for swapping batteries to be kind of a pain, but I feel it is worth it for the IB technology.

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I never cared for the field stock on the Benelli M4 personally. The only real benefit of the collapsible stock is the small storage size. I use the longer length of pull since the sight picture is better for me. The middle position affects the cheek weld significantly. The Sync Mount rides so low that it’s almost like using the iron sights. If it rode higher, the middle position might be more comfortable for me. I’m 6’2, so fortunately the longer length position isn’t an issue for me.

 

I’ll take a picture of the light setup today. The lamps machine easily in the lathe. It only took a few minutes to get it reprofiled. I then hit the machines area with some fine grit sandpaper while it was spinning.

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Here is the M600IB model installed on my H2O Extreme build that is slowly being built up. Removing the barrel isn't an issue with the close fit of the lamp head. I'll send this unit out for painting to match the H2O soon. I ordered two more of these lights, I'll machine one of them to go on my burnt bronze build, and one is for the AR15 that doesn't need modified.

 

Also attached below is some shots of the barrel shadowing, and the benefits of the IB model light. The output is significantly cut down at close quarters, and instantly ramps up to 600 lumens at further ranges.

 

xdSTNEh.jpg

 

j7IRsmE.jpg

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