James Burton

A Sons of Liberty Gun Works rifle featuring accessories from Forward Controls Design... For Roger Wang at Forward Controls Design, the small things aren't small...in fact, they're everything. As a maker of AR parts and accessories, Forward Controls Design is currently putting out a wide variety of high-quality AR parts. We recently sat down with Roger Wang to learn more about the company and some of the small, well-thought out components he is producing. Q: Roger, can we start with a bit about your background and the philosophy behind Forward Controls Design? Roger Wang, Forward Controls Design: I started Forward Controls Design in late 2014, shortly after my departure from Battle Arms Development, which I co-founded in 2009. My former partner and I are on good terms, but times and directions change. I like to say I didn’t leave so I could do something new. My designs had always centered around ergonomics and practicality for folks that use the AR as a tool, and Forward Controls Design continues on today with the same mindset. Now, my educational background is in IT and networking. I work in connectivity and LAN/WAN design...so it makes sense the logical and no-nonsense approach in my other profession manifests itself in Forward Controls products, as our designs are utilitarian and measured, with modest aesthetics. A More Intuitive Interface I don’t believe that any gear can take the place of training, that is not our goal. Our target audience is law enforcement , military, and anyone that uses their AR for defense. Our designs and products aim to make users more efficient...by making the machine-to-human interface more intuitive. Q: Can you talk about how you approach improving the AR platform. It's much easier said than done... Roger Wang, Forward Controls Design: The AR design is pretty old…from back in the 1960’s. There have been a lot of improvements and enhancements since then, but most have been ad-hoc efforts. Unfortunately, the common theme I’ve seen with ad-hoc solutions is that, in the process of solving one problem, it usually inadvertently creates another. Subsystems in Harmony Our approach to improving gear and components is from a wider, ergonomic standpoint that sees the AR as a living system...where multiple subsystems work together in harmony and balance. And because we view the AR as a tool of a profession, much the same way a carpenter would treat chisels, we prioritize functions over form. We don’t spend a lot of time on aesthetics. For us, the design has to work, and work better than the original on which it’s based....the aesthetics part is easy. Forward Controls Design Enhanced Magazine Release - $14.95 Free Lunches and Unintended Consequences So, where we do spend the time is on the development side, because, simply put, there's no "free lunch." We can't add, remove, or modify something in an existing design without also considering how it might affect something else...and it almost always does. Unintended consequences tend to have real world implications and results, so a lot of development time is spent vetting designs to ensure we don’t fix one problem and create another... A lot of what you do seems simple on the surface, but when you look closer, it's apparent a lot of thought is put into what you’re doing. Roger Wang, Forward Controls Design: I’m a bit of a history buff...and an important lesson is you can over-engineer to the point where it’s not just diminished return, it becomes a detriment. Also, just because you over-engineer, it does not mean you are going to get that much more out of it. For me, it comes down to robustness and practicality. So, when a single piece component is now made of three or four pieces, unless you can justify the benefits, it’s not worth it. Simplicity has benefits well beyond maintaining or lowering parts counts. “simplicity is the sign of truth.” Simplex Sigillum Very One of my favorite Latin phrases is “Simplex sigillum very” or “simplicity is the sign of truth.” Anybody can make things complicated. To make things simple is not as easy as it sounds. It’s a paradox. We spend a lot of time making complicated ideas into simple products. That’s our motto…keep it simple. It keeps costs down…and there are fewer things to break. And at the end of the day, for those that go to war or on patrol with their ARs and M16s...frankly, they don’t care how they look. They just need them to work. The fewer parts a design has, the more reliable it can be. And I can tell you...few things ever benefitted from complicated designs that invariably involve more parts...parts that can and do fail. Enhanced Magazine Release But you are correct that the simple design of our products can belie the amount of thought that went into them. One example of this is our magazine release button. We call it the EMR…the Enhanced Magazine Release. It’s a mag release button for the right side of the AR. It’s still a single piece...not a three or four-piece design…but it’s curved so that it automatically centers your finger in the middle. It has horizontal serrations to mitigate vertical movement and keep your finger on the button. Its design goals are pretty simple, but it is a pain to make because you need a 4th axis machine to produce it. Forward Controls Design's Enhanced Magazine Release The EMR doesn’t have screws that can be lost, and it doesn’t stick out of the magazine release fence to make it more prone to snagging and accidental mag drops. There is no reason to make something like this difficult and complicated. A single piece with thought put into it can make a lot of difference. Q: Your forward assist also has a bit of a different look and feel to it. Roger Wang, Forward Controls Design: Certainly, and that one is another good example of a simple design. We call it the LDFA, or Low Drag Forward Assist. From the way it looks, you might think there’s nothing special about it except for it does not have a rim. The reason that came along was because from the moment I used an ambi charging handle, I realized that if I was to use my right hand to pull the charging handle back, the rim of the forward assist would be in the way of my fingernail. Ambidextrous charging handle is a recent development for the AR, but it doesn’t take the A2 forward assist into account. It’s a classic example of unintended consequences.( You can train to curl your finger to avoid the rim, except if I am a right-handed shooter, I probably only train to shoot from my weak side 20 percent of the time, and may not have it trained into muscle memory. So, the LDFA design is a simple and effective solution. Forward Controls Design LDFA (Low Drag Forward Assist) $39.99 at AR15Discounts.com Prices accurate at time of writing View Details For a left hand shooter or right hand shooter that shoots from the weak side, if they use the ambi charging handle’s right latch to pull back on the charging handle, their finger and knuckle will simply glide right over the forward assist. Simple, Well Researched Solutions. So, a lot of what we do at Forward Control Designs is similar to this…it’s a response, a simple, well researched solution to a simple problem. When you over-complicate, you are not really helping the user. You may be making it look pretty to sell things, I don’t really care about that. I want our products to make a difference. I want to make things easy for the people who depend on them for their lives. Dimpled version of the Forward Controls Design SBCG Bolt Carrier Group Q: Your SBCG bolt carrier group is quite interesting...can you talk a bit about what SBCG means, and what's different about it? Roger Wang, Forward Controls Design: The SBCG stands for Secure staking Slick side Bolt Carrier Group. What’s different about it is we use Ned Christiansen’s optimized carrier key screws, that once staked, they are almost impossible to walk out. That’s much more important than the way it looks…Another part that we did improve on a little bit was the proportion on the carrier forward of the gas vents. That area is scalloped out to accommodate the port cover’s spring loaded detent and housing. Forward of that, there is an area that we have made into a pseudo-forward assist. We have either serrations or dimples there so that if you ever wanted to do a soft close, or if your bolt is out of battery, you can press on the serrated or dimpled area and close the bolt. It does not take the place of a real forward assist which you can exert a lot of force on, but the serration or dimples are convenient, easier and faster to access. Forward Controls Design NP3 M16 Bolt Carrier Group. $247.00 at AR15Discounts.com Prices accurate at time of writing View Details I deem the original bolt carrier design so good, I don’t see a real reason to change it that much. If you make it too light or heavy, there is a price to pay somewhere. I believe the AR is a system that is fine tuned and you cannot just add or subtract or remove weight without consequences. Q: In your position, you have a unique perspective on the AR...any advice you'd give someone new to the platform? Roger Wang, Forward Controls Design: Everyone has different needs and different likes. For someone who is brand new to the AR, I’d say get a Colt, Sionics, or Sons of Liberty Gunworks AR as a solid, well built basis...and take courses with it. From there, you’ll quickly learn what you like and find wanting. You can always add accessories to it to tailor your needs. I’d avoid anything that looks overly flashy. That’s because there’s a good chance that item was built just for looks. So, take classes…go shoot while moving, and in strange positions. Once you get outside of the square range, chances are, you’ll find out what works and what doesn’t work. I would recommend for an absolute beginner to wait to build an AR until a bit later. Your first attempt may not work, especially if you take it to a class where you’re...