Those green SA guns were a suburb deal! By the time I read about them on an AR forum they were already sold out. Did your gun have the standard lower or the MARS?

I haven't owned a large format MARS.

Honestly, the ambi deal is a little overblown. Unless you're left handed and ALL of your ARs are identical you're going to have muscle memory issues. I use my MARS guns like regular ARs, but do think it is a better design than the original one-sided.

If you get a chance to pick up a 5.56 CQB/MRP gun I highly recommend it. The New Zealand carbine looks super neat, but the 1913 CQB (and especially MRP) are pretty heavy with LMT's barrel profile. My MARS CQB-MLOK (pictured) is lightweight enough to serve as a general purpose carbine. I gave up on the "forward dog collar hold" that was hyper popular on the internet because it causes arm fatique quickly so I don't need 12 inches of "rail space". Plus, the only think I mount on the front of my guns ... front sight, light, and MAYBE a handstop of some sort. This doesn't take a lot of "rail estate".