Honest review - Samson SIG 556 Rails - STAR-556 Rail

I bought the rail to give the gun a more "modern" look and feel. Accuracy, was said to improve after installing this rail, after reading online forums. Well, that was not at all the case. In my case, accuracy suffered about 50-75% loss with various ammunition. I tried accuracy tests using Sellier & Bellot, TulAmmo, Red Army Std, Winchester, PMC, PPU and, the infamous, Mil-Surp boxes. This gun is no tac-driver to begin with, but, thats not what it was designed for.

Any gun with this much rail space will be a cheese grater on the hands and sand bags. I installed the Surefire Rail Ladders on every exposed Picatinny and it complemented the rail perfectly. Im not sure what the cut out on the bottom forward end of the handguard is for, but, that still has some sharp corners that are still exposed. Still, its a well handling forend.

The install was really easy, and no gunsmith was required. I installed all fasteners using Loc-tite Green, as it is the ONLY thing that has kept ALL of my fasteners for EVER coming off, regardless of heat, or round count.

Disassembly of the complete weapon is no longer as easy as Sig designed it to be. The "Piston Tube" no longer comes out by 1/4 turn and pull out. There's a notch on top of the "Piston-Tube" that becomes trapped by the channel in the top of the handguard. Thus, requiring one to remove the Top portion of the handguard, along with any optics that might have been installed over the rail screws. Not a show stopper, as not everyone is that meticulous about cleaning. Without removing the handguard, the inside of the tube may still be cleaned through the front opening, from where the piston assembly is removed.

The reason I do don't recommend this rail is that it's a bit too much work to get this setup to be a practical gun, for the money, unless it stays in the safe or only comes out once in a while for bench work of around 50 rounds. For those 500+ round days of drill after drill style shooting, it needs less cheese grater effect.

The SIG556/SIG556R's stock handguard's work fine for someone who won't be hanging toasters and DVD players off of their gun.

The Quality of the handguard is pretty top notch. No flaws or imperfections any where that I noticed. The fit was really nice.

I honestly think that the mounting method on the Samson handguard is much better than the Troy Ind. equivalent. The Samson setup allows the barrel to expand FWD and AFT as the barrel heats up and cools down with very little to no resistance.

Word of advice, INSTALL ALL FASTENERS USING LOC-TITE GREEN.