I'm interested in knowing what the consequences are if I steal the GRSM and give it to McLafferty. Does the Gun Runners vendotron stick around. Does it shut down the GR factory? Does Mclafferty start making all the quality weapons?

Never done the related quest so I'm trying to gather info.

Steal it without alerting anyone and the Gun Runners will continue doing business as usual.
Go in guns blazing they get hostile for a few days but everything should be fine.

Thx Razalas, interesting answer. I wouldn't have guessed it.

But does retrieving it affect Blake's inventory?

This is a question I have too.

As far as I know, it doesn't affect anything but an ending slide.