BS. You are talking to an expert here. I know how to accurize rifles and the M14 doesn’t need that much work to accurize it. On top of that it is already in existence. To get this M110 they had to develop a whole new rifle. How much work do you think that took? The M14 is a lot lighter than 16 lbs.
“To get this M110 they had to develop a whole new rifle.”
AR-10s have been around about as long as M-14s have. I don’t think it took much ot come up with this. I have a DPMS which has similar features.
I think that an expert should know that the original AR-10 came out about the same time as the M-14 did and that the civilian version of the M110 has been in existence for years. This model is based on the Knight Arms SR-25, which has been in production and for sale since 1990. Wikipedia says that the 15.3 lb weight is with scope, bipod and loaded magazine, which sounds about right in my experience.