Florida Shooters Network

Gunsmoke was a small time AR15 manufacturer/dealer that used to be popular on the gun show circuit. They sold nice milspec (?) lowers for cheap (I think $50 or so). If I remember right, dad started the company and the son ran it into the ground. They developed a reputation for off-spec parts, unknown quality, and poor business practices. One day I get a knock on the door from our good friends that kill dogs asking me about the lowers I got from GSE. "Did they ever try to sell you machine gun parts?" "Uh, no." Turns out that they sold guns/gun stuff to a convicted felon and it included parts to build a machine gun, and dude got arrested in 2011 for it.

Saw this pop up on Gunbroker and it reminded me of them. It's a similar story of Anvil Arms.

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/893746151

I used to talk to the son, Eddy at the shows. And yes, one day at the WPB show he did offer me a “lightning link” for an AR. I told him “thanks, but no thanks” that I didn’t want to be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life, & to be careful who he made that offer to. Sure enough, he did get busted a few months later. But I did get a beautiful British FAL from him that he took in on trade at the Ft. Lauderdale show. The shop was in Okeechobee, & the Shotgun News did an article about them before Eddy f#cked up. GARY.

He was building ARs with RR lowers and selling them as real RRs.

He sucked two of my friends into buying them.

One finally got his running right after LOTS of work and many new parts.

The other one made his into a wall hanger display and its still hanging there almost 20 years later.

Ed was a piece of work.


And speaking of Anvil Arms, I nearly went to work for Jon about three months before he flamed-out. Glad I didn't get caught up in that crap storm.

A little gun show trivia for you.

Jon and Spike got their start by splitting ONE table at the gun shows!

Me and Spike talked about it the last time I saw him.

Kinda funny where they both ended up.

TC6969 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 03, 2021 9:57 am A little gun show trivia for you.

Jon and Spike got their start by splitting ONE table at the gun shows!

Me and Spike talked about it the last time I saw him.

Kinda funny where they both ended up.

I didn't know that. I met Jon at the Palm Beach show and I liked the roll mark and finish of his lowers, so I bought an SBR through him. He etched "REGISTERED SBR" on it, which I didn't like, but it was too late to remove it. Fast forward to the time it gets out of jail, and he's no longer welcome at the Palm Beach show, so I had to drive four hours to pick it up. Paperwork was all messed up and had to be redone and restamped (I have both copies still). He was working on the reboot of the LRM169 9mm integrally suppressed AR15 upper at the time, and I kept in contact because I just HAD to have one. Comes out, I buy one of the first ones and had it shipped to Kurt locally. He folded nearly immediately afterwards. The upper is great, and I love it, don't know if LRM sold the rights to anyone after that.

I purchased my second AR from Gunsmoke at Ft. Lauderdale show in 2001.
I talked to the father (I don't remember his name) and purchased a factory Bushmaster carbine from him. First time I took it to the range I noted the hammer pin would constantly work it's way out after firing few rounds. I took it home and found the hammer spring was installed backwards with the leg below the pin instead of above it. I started taking the AR apart and started noticing a lot of stuff wrong with it. Some internal parts looked used and the gas key on the bolt was moving because the screws were not staked and were unscrewing. I called Gunsmoke couple times but didn't get anywhere with them so I called Bushmaster. They asked me to ship the gun back to them and they would take care of it. About a week later I get a call from Bushmaster asking me to send to them a copy of my receipt for the purchase. Few days later I get a call from again BM and they said the AR I purchased was not a Bushmaster AR...that they sold only receivers and some barrels but not complete guns to Gunsmoke. Bushmaster did take care of me by replacing all the used parts and fixed/staked the gas key properly. I never dealt with them again and I discouraged several of my friends from buying Gunsmoke products.
I heard they were doing some shady stuff and the son went to prison for a while. I don't know if they are still in business at Okeechobee.

It seems everybody I know has a story about Gunsmoke...non good, all bad.

Now that I think about it, I did buy a RR marked AR in 2001 from them. It worked great, but one day a friend offered me $200 more than I paid for it. So I sold it, & saw Eddy at the Ft. Lauderdale show the next week. I always liked heavy barrel AR’s, but M-4’s were hot that week. He had Bushmasters at the time, & told me to buy the gun, & his Dad would swap out the upper when they came in, as long as I didn’t fire the AR. A few weeks later I called the Dad, told him what Eddy said, & he said to mail him the M-4 upper. A week later I received the heavy barrel upper I wanted. 19 years later, & it’s never missed a beat. Matter of fact, I wasn’t happy with the trigger in the gun, so at the next show I dry fired all the AR’s he had, & when I found one I liked, I asked him to install that FCG into my gun. He gave me a look, but did what I asked. Took him all of 3 minutes. So I have no complaints with Ed Sr, or Jr. GARY

Bought a FAL from him that literally blew up in my face on the second round due to excessive headspace. I brought it back to the next show (the gun checker at the door was a bit taken aback trying to band the blown out receiver) and plunked it on his table. He quickly hid it under his table and refunded my money. I think the multiple scabs on my face told him this was not an issue to argue about, especially in the middle of a show.

I was just talking about Anvil Arms and Jon Kruger the other day with my son. I bought a couple of consecutive S/N lowers probably 15 years ago. I have the one I SBR'd for myself, and my son still has his. Jon had a good thing going.... lots of sales, a growing business, and had a decent reputation. He threw it, and his real job away.