Rivets are so 19th Century, Home built AKs

Damn finally! I have done quite a few Saiga mods and debanned a few AKs.
However, I never finished a build. Well I guess building from a completed NOdak spud frame is almost a whole build.
It was a tantal kit.

Costs:
tantal kit shipped from gunthings $234
hotbarrel piston $15
Nodak frame $96
FFL transfer $25
g2 $25
baseplate for mag. Already had it
tools ,well way too many hours welding grinding and sweating.
So $400 ish into a rifle.

See I got into the kit collecting and building thing way too late. Well actually I had a few kits before I just was way too busy to build anything. I find that if I know I have to invest a lot of energy into building tools and such I put off the project.

The demil and build went pretty smooth, I kinda crunched the rivets a bit and then one hole on the frame had to be reamed a bit. I do also need to open up the magwell ever so slightly because only half of my mags go in really smoothly. To do the rivets I am using a set of modified bolt cutters which work ok. I would love to get a fancy ak builder rivet tool, however I am giving Curtis too much of my money anyway. The headspace was good and cycles and all. Of course the real test is how it groups on paper.

I think I am going to start into bending my own flats so this will probably be the only build like this. So there goes another $200 plus bones to Curtis at www.akbuilder.com.
headspace was good and cycles and all.
My next build is a Full stock Bulgarian ak-74 build and I will do a detailed step by step for that one and post it here.


Lastly a pic of it with last week's project, the Saiga 12. I did a very basic pistol grip conversion to this. I got to practice my welding on this. Man my welding foo is weak.
Next project will be heavy in detail. For all 3 of you that read this blog.

The Battle Rifle

While I have shot and enjoyed many firearms my favorite is the battle rifle. When I say battle rifle I mean a rifle firing full power ammo in a semi automatic format.
Full size/power ammo in calibers such as:
308 win or 7.62X51mm Nato
7.62X54mmR
30/06
8mm Mauser
etc.
I guess many people will argue about what exactly qualifies as a BR but here are a few in my mind.
FN-49 in its many chamberings
M1 Garand
FN FAL
SVT
M14 or M1A
HK G3 or HK91

I own a few great ones, I have an FN FAL clone that is my knock around in the truck rifle. It will eat any ammo I put through it. I just recently just shot the last of my slightly tarnished mixed up, and stomped on Israeli surplus that I picked up from century in the 90s. I think I had 10k of that stuff but, at $50 shipped in a 50 cal ammo can one cannot be too picky.
These rifles can do everything that you want. You can hunt damn near any game on this continent with them. In the military arena you can task them as a Designated Marksman rifle (DMR). In my opinion they are great rifles to shoot NRA high power competitions. In fact when was younger there was a guy at my local club who would smoke many of us with an FN-49 in 7mm argentine. IIRC. Plus the simple fact they are just fun to shoot.

My current project is rehabbing a Polytech M14s. It is a great rifle and it never suffered from the soft bolt problems that I feel were mostly made up bull shit from gunwriters. More to the point Polytech never really set up a media PR organization here in the states. While Springfield Armory has one and well you draw your own conclusions. Don't get me wrong I am not bashing Springfield one of the only rifles I miss is an M1A bush rifle I sold in 1998 that was amazing in how accurate it was.
If you doubt the commie versions of this rifle just give Ron Smith or Tim Straight a call and ask them. If you have no clue who they are well google is your friend.
Back to this rifle, it is a Polytech that I fitted (well Tim Straight did) with a GI bolt, trigger group, and I have it sitting in an Ugly E2 stock. I left the original chrome lined barrel, op rod, and gas cylinder. My next step is to fill in the FA selector, bed the action to the stock, fit a standard recoil pad to it and then paint it somehow.

Of course this has been an ongoing project for me due to the fact I have over 11 guns in various stages of what I consider completion.

Now this next part is the one where I will piss many of you off.

The Battle rifle I dislike the most is the G3. The delayed roller lock system is horrible for a civilian shooter. It destroys the brass, due to the fluted chamber. Yes you can reload it but it reduces the life of them plus it makes it ugly. Very few ways to mount optics. (big one for me) The recoil is greater than others due to the method of operation. Plus my biggest complaint is it is a bitch to clean. I have a fetish for clean guns and the roller block system is not compatible with that. All that being said the G3 is almost AK reliable. Plus the system in use for a subgun ala the MP5 is amazing.