AK Build Class !?!

[tacmedic]

Okay folks, that's it the class is full. If you haven't made prior arrangements or payment don't disappear I will do more classes as needed. I just don't want class sizes to be too big and quality suffer.

If you have a kit you purchased previously and want to build it please PM me with what you have so I can start figuring out what's needed and we will get all those kits that have been sitting around collecting dust made into rifles.

 

[tacmedic]

For those attending the class, let me know if you want to want the scope mount ($35), standard issue sling ($10).

 

[JLW]

Please let me know when you have the next one.

 

[tacmedic]

Please let me know when you have the next one.

Will do.

 

[tacmedic]

If you have a parts kits just sitting around, rusting, and you want to turn it into something awesome then let me know. I am more than happy to help you guys out provided there is enough of you to justify giving up my weekend to do you. Need 6 people minimum.

 

[tacmedic]

7 shooters 300 meters! Great weekend. More details soon. I'm smoked...goodnight.

 

[tacmedic]

I have asked the students to post their reviews, critiques, and pics. I figure their opinions on the class are far more important than mine.

 

[HiredHand]

Hitting a man sized steel target at 300 yards with iron sights is a pretty sweet reward for a weekend of labor building an AKM or AK74. Bottom line here is that if you are interested in building an AKM or AK74 rifle with your own hands then you should take advantage of Tacmedic's knowledge and experience.

I had a great time this weekend. I want to thank everyone that participated in the class both instructors and each individual putting his own rifle together.

 

[Dr_Mitch]

Alright, this class was excellent! It was a very long weekend, but we made it through with some truly excellent rifles to show for it. It was actually a pretty good value overall, and I feel like I got more than my money's worth out of it. It was quite easy to shoot out to 300 yards and make good hits with iron sights. The rifle I built is wonderful.

We started on Friday night at 6:30pm with a quick meet and greet and some information from Jeff about the history and design of the AK pattern, followed by accounting for all parts in our kits. The only real difference in my kit from any others was that I chose the ALG AKT for my trigger parts while everyone else got an Arsenal trigger. Both are excellent triggers, and I actually feel like the Arsenal trigger has a much better break even though it is about twice as heavy as the ALG AKT. We drilled our receivers for front trunion holes before leaving on Friday at about 9:30pm.

Saturday start time was 8:30am and we worked until 9:30pm. It was fantastic. We riveted the front trunions in, drilled the receiver for rear trunion holes and riveted the rear trunions, pressed in barrels and headspaced bolts, drilled barrels for cross pins and pressed in the barrel pins. After that we pressed all the barrel parts on: rear sight block, handguard cap (no pressing needed, it goes on by hand), gas block, and front sight tower. We then drilled for all relevant cross pins and pinned these parts in place. Those of us that finished early began fitting the stocks and handguards to our receivers.

Sunday we started at 8:30am again. We riveted on trigger guards, finished installing the furniture, and installed trigger groups. I actually had to do a lot of fitting of my trigger to the safety due to having used the AKT, but it didn't take too long, maybe 1/2 hour. We then went through a presentation on AK sights and zeroing fundamentals, and then went to the range and began zeroing. It took about two hours to zero. It was a weird process, but the results were incredible. We zeroed at 100 yards for a 300 yard zero. To me it seemed retarded in theory because I have found the conventional info about AR-15 zeroing to be just as false as anyone else who has ever bothered to test it out. I was skeptical, but with standard ammo and a standard barrel length, it worked just like it was supposed to. Pretty slick. Too cool.

After zeroing we went to the long range and hammered on steel at 100, 200, and 300 yards while verifying that our rear sight elevations were correct. It was beautiful how well it all fell together.

General observations: we built the rifles. The rifles were not built for us. We did everything ourselves and it was a bit intimidating at first, but midway through day two we were going at it like we knew what we were doing. The course was put on by Jeff, but he had help from another knowledgable and cool guy named Josh as well as assistance from his almost-son-in-law Justin as well. They all had experience building AK-pattern guns. Anytime we had questions or needed verification, or reassurance, we got it. We had great step-by-step instruction, but again we built our own rifles. We fit our own parts, headspaced our own barrels, pressed our own rivets, drilled out our own holes. It was a lot of work, and it really didn't sink in how awesome it was until 2/3 of the way through day two. It was very enjoyable. We had a lot of different fixtures and specialized tools to that we were exposed to, and we could try each to see if one was preferable to the other. The barrel pressing jig was really excellent and was sort of a custom setup.

I think that the only downside was that we shared one set of hand tools. That made it a waiting game sometimes, but not for too long. We were at workbenches with two people assigned to each bench, and two of the groups were father-son build teams, and that was cool to see. Some of us were much more experienced with metalworking than others, so there were some wait-times due to that situation, but we all made it through. I was the only person who came with a unfinished receiver, meaning no coating, just bare steel. That sucked, but we were responsible for providing the receiver and I apparently did not find a very good deal on mine although the quality of it was excellent. Jeff said I could coat it at a later time, so there's that.

I was pretty busy working most of the time, but here are some pics I did get:

 

[GUN DOG]

I can't add anything to Mitch s info. We built one of each akm & a ak74. They both shot incredibly well. The boy and I had a great time he shoots very well. Young eyes. I finally got on the 300 when Jeff realised I had my sights set on 100 oops. Bifocals are not the best for long range iron sights have to do something about that. If you want an Ak and are willing to work this is the most rewarding experience you can have.