So....I have a brand new beautiful Radical Arms 458 SOCOM upper with a 16" melonite barrel and wicked muzzle break in my safe, all scoped out with a Burris e1 2-7x32mm.....and I haven't shot it. Ever. I love the IDEA of the gun--I absolutely love my 45-70 and think the SOCOM would also be a blast (so to speak). But I haven't shot it. I haven't even loaded rounds for it yet. I trimmed half my brass and gave up or got busy with other projects.

While I LOVE the IDEA of the SOCOM, I'm not sure I can justify it. It's kinda like most Busses I've owned--love them, but can't bring myself to use them. Part of the problem is ammo. Loaded rounds are still about $40-60/box, which I figured "No problem! I reload and already have ton of 45-70 bullets, so I can do this one on the cheap!" But I'm finding life and time gets in the way.

Awesome tree stand gun, right? That and a great anti-personnel round if needed. BUT....I have a Blackout that shoots great and has the same effective range as the 458 (about 200 ydrds, give or take)! I've got a 6.5 Grendel that I can't wait to finish sighting in so I can snipe deer off out to 500 yards. And of course I have my trusty 223--stainless match grade 16" barrel with a 1:7 twist. Right bullet and it becomes a great deer round as well! That's my problem, I think. Too many calibers, not enough time. I'm also getting shoulder problems and worry the recoil on the SOCOM might be more than I want at this point. I already have a Guide Gun to slam my shoulder

So I am thinking I should sell the upper, keep the lower (or maybe sell the whole thing and buy a new lower...), and add an 18-20" 223 to the mix, be down one less caliber to load for, and put a few hundred dollars back in the bank AND make my wife happy (which really is the FIRST consideration).

I LOVE big bore guns and WANT an ultimate big bore AR, but does it really fill a niche I need filling? Does it give me more manliness; manliness I will lose if I sell it?

I think the answer is "sell--pass this on to someone with more time to reload (or money for ammo) and who will use it more often." I have the entire set up ready to go--just add a press, powder, and primers.

Or maybe wait until November and sell in the panic buying likely to accompany this election cycle I'm not in this for arbitrage, but selling for 3x the original price ...

Would love to hear pros and cons I'm not considering