Awesome, count me in then!

And in my defense, I wasn't even aware a spacer revision existed until I received it––then looked here.  I ordered it as soon as I saw the Military Arms review.

Had to file the bottom of the button to get it to go to the rear all the way. Same problem as others. But after that the cover lined up great.  I fired 180rds through it today. All seems to be ok. I have the same wear at the cover opening from spent cases, & the same wear points inside the cover at the rear. So far I only see a faint indent from the back of the bolt hitting the spacer. More rounds will be needed.
I got my Eotech COM zeroed. All I could do at the indoor range until next week when I can go outside & zero from the bench at 50 yards.

Something I noticed was there was less recoil. Is that a by product of the spacer?

Some notes on the filing. I used 120grit sand paper, took about 15 minutes of sanding & fitting.  
Cleaned it up, used some Aluminum Black on the parts, & then a coat of oil.

AK is a WASR 10/63 about 3 years old.

Yeah, sandpaper is the way to go.  It only takes a little to remove enough material to fit it to the trunnion groove.

That's interesting that you are getting the same wear marks on your cover.  Did your ejection pattern change from the casings hitting the cover?  I thought mine might have, but I didn't pay attention too carefully.

Actually, I meant...have you considered designing the cover so there is less material there?  Or would the spent casings continue to strike the cover regardless?  Any idea why they don't seem to hit the stock cover?  (Or maybe they do?)

Don't know yet. When I can use my outdoor range I'll have a better indication.

Rafaga,

I have already filed just a little on my recoil assembly and wouldn't feel right asking you to exchange it for a new one, so I'd prefer just to buy a whole new recoil piece without the spacer, if possible. :)

Email sent.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/267608_10150202068928204_530808203_7020571_7454712_n.jpg


i was thinkin of seeing if i could exchange/return my button due to having to chew it up with the dremel to cut off that spacer, disappointed it was attached prior to shipping, really wish it was just included separately for those who need it installed to do it themselves. but whatever, i can just weld the gap shut where i cut out the remaining material where the holes for its pin were. (cut off where its red)



http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v640/gruzergrub5000/PIC_0064.jpg

also bent the heck out of the wire spring guide that was attached to the receiver button,  which was frustrating having to do this as soon as i got it, real hard to hold that small thing down firmly while dremeling but ive bent it back in place enough to not jam the spring up


its a real tight fit on my gp wasr, almost makes me want to shave a little bit of material off the rear end lip of the cover, not quite sure yet.

didnt bother using the leaf spring, but if its a problem for whatever reason without it, ill just put it in later, seems just fine without it.


best purchase ive made for my AK besides my ACE ltd folding stock.

Here's how I did it. I used a 1/6" Dremel cutoff wheel.

I placed the assembly in a vice, gripping it by the spacer since that would get thrown out anyway. I initially tried to remove the pin and tap it out, however I found that it wouldn't budge. Instead of fighting it I decided to cut the "ears off."  Holding the spacer itself in the vice I had quite a bit of control over the cut. I cut where the red line was and stopped at the green line so as not to damage the button. I stopped about 1/6th of an inch... so I used two hands on the dremel just tapping the last 1/6th until I was satisfied. The spacer still in the vice: I used a pair of vice grips to grip the "ear," and just rocked it back and forth until it snapped (since there is only a thin piece of metal left this was pretty easy.. and it made a clean break). I repeated the process for the other side. The button came out clean with one barely noticeable scratch on the finish.

http://img815.imageshack.us/img815/7762/spacer.jpg

Wait, but didn't Rafaga say that this version won't work without the spacer?  You'd have to dremel back material where the two slots are, and then you are in danger of weakening it.  Fortunately, he is in the process of making new replacements without the spacer.

i have no vice, i tried cutting the ears off first, but i couldnt get a good grip on them with any pliers i had, so i wasnt able to break them off.


frustrating having to cut that thing off, cursing about how stupid it is to have it on there in the first place for only one ?variant, but once it was off i was happy, but the way i cut it, will that be a problem?


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v640/gruzergrub5000/PIC_0064.jpg


that should hold up during firing right? i do plan to just weld that gap shut when i get a chance to use a friend's welder.


also, do i really need the leaf spring?










i am ranting about that spacer, such a load of trouble for me trying to hold it steady with my fingers awfully close to  a dremel
dont care now, just need to weld that gap lol

You should be able to use a blackjack buffer to act as a spacer.

That's correct.

That's correct also.

1) You haven't brought yourself up to speed on all the details. Go back and re-read the previous posts before making such a comment. I treat everyone here with respect and demand the same.

2) Yes.

3) No.

4) Yes.

5) Yes.

yeah i was cursing about it while dremeling away, drove me nuts but once i got the spacer off i was fine with a big ole smile, just reminiscing about it still irks me,  dont mean to offend though it does seem i have rubbed the wrong way lol,  dont worry though all is well, it is THE product to get for any AK.

Yeah. It locks the front mount in.  With it not on there the front will wiggle. Also allows some pressure on the front pin while the cover is raised up so it will hold the cover up instead of flopping down when you open it.

well tried welding that gap shut where i had to cut out to get rid of the spacer, just gotta try it and see if it holds up or blows up tomorrow if i go shooting.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v640/gruzergrub5000/2011-06-24205620.jpg

how much does a new receiver button cost and ETA as to when a batch is expected to get finished and shipped? i guess count me in for a new one as well.

My jaw is hanging open looking at that weld. No man, you need to fill that gap all the way up. What you have is not sufficient!

If you fire your rifle and that piece comes apart, you could easily damage the TWS top cover itself, your face, and possibly the rear of your receiver.

Don't shoot that thing until that gap is all the way filled!!

Geez guys, When I was playing around, I just tapped the pin out with a punch and hammer to remove the spacer, then put it back in and re staked it because I saw that it wouldn't work without it. No need to hack the takedown button apart with a dremel!

yeah i thought i told him to weld it up but ill have to do that today and go shootin tomorrow, once i got home i realized how much the weld sucked, poor lighting in my friend's shop made it look like it was welded up good, then i get home and it wasnt.

and ive got nothing to hammer the pin out, i tried whatever i had on me and i couldnt get it off that way.

Harbor Freight, is your friend. :D

Let me amend my statement above about not shooting until the gap was all the way filled up:

You need to:

1) make sure that gap is all the way filled up, then

2) file it to bring it back to it's original dimension, then

3) you need to cover the side that faces the carrier with black paint, magic marker, etc, reassemble, and vigorously hand cycle to check to make sure your carrier isn't leaving impact marks on any part of the face that faces the carrier. Marks on the sides are okay. If it does leave impact marks on the side that faces the carrier, you need to

4) file that section down a little and repeat steps 3 and 4, recoating with paint or magic marker each time, until you get no more impact marks.

Otherwise, you're going to break your recoil assembly, takedown button, or the topcover.

1- yep its been filled now
2- id like to say its been filed down enough
3- ive hand cycled quite a bit yesterday, no sticking or anything, paint i put on hasnt come off, other than on the sides which is fine
4- no impact marks

never got a chance to go shooting yesterday, maybe today.

Link to full version of the review, with photos linked to larger photos, and more links.  I've spent a good deal of time writing, editing, re-editing, and taking photos for the review.  It was 3 pages in Microsoft Word before adding pics and some additional content.  I'm not trying to lure anyone in for advertising, as my site/blog has no advertising.  I just don't have time to edit links for multiple forum formats.  I'm not sure the forum owners want the whole thing taking up server space either.




Return-To-Zero
The TWS mount is supposed to hold a zero, through the simple machine elements described above, and, for the most part, it does.  After sighting in, I flipped the mount/dust cover up, and unseated the take-down button/recoil spring guide, and then I buttoned everything back up again and vigorously racked the bolt carrier a few times.  I did this return-to-zero test a couple of times.  The first 2 or three shots would go a little bit to the right before the recoiling bolt carrier fully seated the take-down button/recoil spring guide against the rear of the dust cover/mount.  After those first few rounds, the bullets would start going through into 10-ring again.  At 12 paces the difference was maybe half an inch for the 1st round.  I can live with that.

This testing was done without fitting the recoil spring guide to the stock trunnion.  Return-to-zero may be better now that it’s fitted –– more on this when I get to installation.

Installation
The mount didn't come with any instructions.  Having read through the ak47.net forum thread, and seen a YouTube video on how to remove an AK rear sight, I knew what I had to do.  That TWS Gen. II Scope Mount thread currently stands at 69 pages, and it's still going.  The mount should come with an instruction sheet, it's not a simple drop-in/bolt-on installation.  I was able to get the mount installed in 25-30 minutes, with a lot of that time spent fighting to get the hinge pin installed against the sight spring pressure.  Like I said, the pin fits tightly, and forcing everything into place took some real effort.  Removing the rear sight from my rifle was not as easy as shown in the video either, so that took maybe 3-5 minutes, instead of about 2 seconds.  Getting the recoil spring removed from the Tantal take-down button/recoil spring guide, and reinstalled on the button/guide supplied with the mount was easier than I had expected, but remember, there were no instructions included, and I was working on prior knowledge from reading 50+ pages of forum posts.  Without knowing what to do, it would have taken a whole lot longer.

I did get the mount installed on the Tantal without cutting or filing anything.  It should be noted however, that fitting the TWS recoil spring guide may be necessary or even required.  The Gen.II mount worked pretty well on my rifle with no modification, but I don’t think stoning/filing the bottom of the TWS recoil spring guide hurts anything, and I’ll feel better knowing that there’s nothing to keep the mount from locking down snug.


Stock TWS spring guide.  Note that both screws are showing.


Romanian Spring Guide.  See how far back it goes?


TWS spring guide with the bottom filed/stoned down some. Note only one screw fully exposed now.

Co-Witness
The rail sits very low, allowing some micro red dot sights to co-witness with the iron sights if you get the TWS peep sight.  With a real Aimpoint Micro, the iron sights show in the lower 1/4 of the tube.  Heights of the tubes of the Aimpoint micro clones often sit higher up and may not allow co-witnessing with the iron sights.  By all accounts the Bushnell TRS-25 micro red dot sight will co-witness, and runs $75-90 some places.  The Primary Arms Gen.7 Red Dot, with the non-removable mount, may also co-witness, but the TRS-25 seems to be more common on the TWS Gen.II Mount.

Putting the rail on top of the dust cover gets the rail very nearly as low as on an Ultimak Scout Mount.  It is lower than the other Beryl-type rails made by Kreb's ($300!?!?), DPH Arms, UTG, or Red Star Arms.

Balance
The TWS rail doesn't add any more weight up front, like a 3 or 4 rail handguard.  Think about it.  Almost all the weight of an AK is forward of the pistol grip. Atxjax on the Glocktalk forum weighed everything, and found that the TWS mount only adds 1.04 ounces, 3.46 ounces with an Aimpoint R1.

Cleaning/Clearing Stoppages
The mount/dust cover flips up, hinged off of what used to be the rear sight block, the rear sight now being mounted on the rail on top of the TWS dust cover.  No tools are required to release the cover, and lift it up, although the bullet tip of a cartridge, a pen, or a similar object can be used to push in the button of the recoil spring guide.  If junk gets in behind the bolt carrier, you just push in the take-down button on the guide rod, and flip up the rail.  The mount doesn't hinder cleaning or maintenance as much as a side-mount.  You can still remove the gas tube for cleaning, and remove the handguard, unlike the Ultimak scout mount, which clamps onto the barrel and blocks the lever that releases the lower handguard.

Heat Transfer
I put 5 magazines through my Tantal with the TWS mount over the course of an hour.  Although there was some heat transfer into the mount through the rear sight block, very little of the heat transferred into the Aimpoint.  The red dot sight stayed more or less at room temperature.

I did the same thing with my WASR with the Ultimak Scout Mountt, and after five magazines, the mount of the Primary Arms red dot was starting to get quite warm.  The Primary Arms sight held up to the heat, but I when I went to clean the rifle, I noticed that the sight was loose on the mount.  I think the heat from the gas tube mount melted the threadlocker I put on the screw that holds it on the rail.

Live Fire
I got the Tantal out to sight in.  The first trip to the range was mostly uneventful.  I had to move the front sight a bit to the right to align with the TWS peep sight, but that's fine with me, because the front sight had been most of the way to the left, over toward the protecting wing of the front sight base.  Elevation was almost spot on.  The tip of the front sight is nearly at the top of the protective wings of the front sight base, but I was able to get the sights lined up for both 25 and 100 yard zeros (only one at a time, obviously, with just one aperture).

For the 2nd outing, I took my Polish AK-74 up north to indoor range for some rapid fire.  Everything was fine, up until the last round of the last magazine I had with me.  The bolt carrier stayed to the rear, which is weird, because AKs don’t normally have anything to hold them open after the last round.  I didn't really think too much of it at the time.  I tapped the charging handle, the bolt carrier slammed home, I dropped the hammer, and cased the rifle and cleaned up.

When I popped the cover open to clean the rifle at home, I found the “spacer” laying loose in behind the trigger.  Half of the pin that was holding the spacer onto the recoil spring guide was rattling around in the receiver.  I’m not sure where the other half of the pin went.  Fell out, I guess.  The top of the spacer had made some contact with the inside of the dust cover, removing some finish, but I don’t think any structural damage was done.  If you scroll up, and look at the picture of the inside of the dust cover, you'll see two silver marks just forward of the square slot in the rear of the cover.  Those silver marks were made by the tabs at the top of the spacer.


Oops!  That's not supposed to happen.

I wasn’t crazy about the idea of a metal spacer in there anyway.  I pulled the Blackjack recoil buffer out of my WASR-10, which didn’t need it anyway, and put it on the TWS guide rod.  The buffer is that blue thing you see in the picture with the cover flipped up.  Nelson of TWS is offering to send out solid recoil spring guides without the spacer.  I think I’ll take him up on that offer.  I’m afraid the whole spacer thing is giving him a bit of a headache.

There is another small matter of peening at the rear of the ejection port.  I'm told that it's from ejecting casings hitting the dust cover on the way out, and I guess this must be true.  I don't think it'll be an issue, but it's something I'm going to keep an eye on.  Nelson at TWS says that that part of the dust cover work hardens, and the peening stops after a certain round count.


Sorry, I couldn't get a better picture.  Camera doesn't do close-ups very well.

Conclusion
A little too early for me to say yet, but the TWS Gen. II mount definitely shows great promise.  I'm looking forward to putting more rounds though the "new" Tantal, and really shaking down the new TWS mount.  I like my "new" modernized Tantal.

Yup

Finished up a prototype yesterday. Was able to get the button issue resolved so that it won't be necessary to remove the release button catch from the rear trunnion. Should have the CNC code finished up by the weekend and will knock out a few test pieces by the following week.

By the way, these Yugos are a lot nicer than most of the other AKs out there.

Cheers

Are you talking about the release button setup for the Yugo or the standard one that is going to replace the one with the spacer that many of us want to exchange?

I'm talking about the release button catch specific to the Yugo.

The standard one to replace the spacer model is already a done deal.

Very cool.  Looking forward to it.

Hello Rafaga,
Just wondering, will the spacer-equipped version be withdrawn from the market? If not how should I specify my choice for the non spacer-equipped version during ordering on line?

The spacer version will be an option for the Saiga 308 guys. We'll add a separate part number for it and update the website in a day or two.

Thx

Can I buy the non spacer button only?  Mine seems to be ok with the spacer, but would like the option.

Well hear I go sounding like a broken record.  I've skimmed the 70+ pages of this thread.  So is it normal for the push button to be flush with the cover?  After appropriate sanding, and oiling the button seats completely in the rear trunion with the top cover up.  But upon closing it, the button remains flush with the cover...so it's not seated properly???  I cycled the action multiple times, and the button is still flush.  So my question is, will the non-spacer version fix this issue?

ETA on the replacement buttons?  Thanks

Yes! I put a wad of cash away as soon as i saw the normal version. Cant wait to give it to you

Fatal05-You don't want the button all the way to the rear with the top cover closed.  It needs to have movement to the rear to adjust for any wear as you fire the rifle.  It if were at the rear to start with you would have no more adjustment and the cover could become loose over time.  The button does need to be able to travel all the way to the rear of the trunion with the cover open.  It sounds like yours is about perfect.

Thanks.  It was just a bit worrisome because the button doesn't stick out at all––making it hard to field strip.  Others with SGL31's seem to have the button stick out at least a little bit.

Yeah Fatal05 you have it right.  Mines the same way. And in fact when I close the cover I can see that the spacer shifts the spring forward purposely so the cover closes over it & then locks it into the cover.
As long as it doesn't pull open by hand when you grab it hard it is fine. So far I have 450 flawless rounds.

You could also adjust the cover a little more to see if it will go any more rearward.

My Siaga .308 had the opposite problem. It let the original button move all the way to the rear.  Rafga made me a new button that needed sanding to fit and fixed the problem, then came out with the version with the spacer version. The spacer works perfectly on my rifles.  The AK has so many variations in the parts that being able to fit the part a bit to your rifle is a good thing. I think you will find your button will move a bit more to the rear as you shoot the rifle, so I would shoot it as is and see.

Yes my turn. My TWS Dog-Leg rail has arrived with instructions and an Allen wrench! After reading 70 pages of this thread I was almost intimidated about the install. My bad I forgot that many in our hobby have no mechanical ability at all. Total install time was 15 min. on an Sgl-20. And that was on the living room floor with a flat blade screwdriver,claw hammer(first hammer I found)and an old t shirt. All of this with my Russian red Dobie trying to help me. Slapped the Primary arms red dot on her and she's good to go. Might swap that out for an Eotech XPS. Since I am at present working in the peoples republic of Maryland range report will be forthcoming as soon as one of my control techs takes me to his overpriced gun club.

This. Anyone know if they're available?

Rafaga,

Any word on the progress on a rear flip-up sight?

Although I now consider the red dot to be my primary sight, I would say that the standard peep is so low that I wouldn't pay extra for one that flips down.  Until someone comes up with a good low-mount 3x magnifier mount, the lower 1/4 co-witness makes for a pretty clutter-free view through the Micro.

I think he means a dual flip aperature sight, while still low.




So you'd end up with something like this:

A windage adjustable, dual aperture rear peep would be great.  I have the same thing on my Krebs rail and it is by far the best AK rear sight I have ever used.

No, actually I just wanted a basic single aperture flip-up sight so I'd have a uncluttered sight picture with my micro.  However, I actually don't have the fixed peep sight.  Are you guys saying that the fixed peep sight doesn't get in your field of view when you run a micro dot?

When using your micro-dot, you don't pay any attention to your sights, or for that matter the micro-dot tube either. You shoulder your weapon & get a cheek weld, with "BOTH EYES OPEN", you look at your target. If your head & eyes are in the correct position, you'll see the red aiming dot on your target. Micros are actually easier to use, the further away they are from your eye. Don't look through the micro tube, as you might using a magnified scope. It feels a little strange at first, but it'll come to you eventually. Good luck

So are you saying the fixed peep doesn't come into your FOV when you do this?  Do you have to deliberately look for it for it to show up?  I guess I could try the fixed peep and see how it goes, but I was waiting to see if Rafaga comes out with a flip-up...he said that he was going to develop one a ways back.

Any issues anticipated with installing this on a Vepr?

You'll need the trusty Dremel to fit it to the RPK trunion. Just match your stamped cover and you'll be good to go..

It really depends on how close micro is to the fixed sight. If you separate then as much as possible, you simply look over the fixed sight to use the micro. By doing it that way, the peep sight will only be a blur, almost unnoticeable. At first you may have to look for the dot until you get accustomed to using it. Your brain is doing all the work here. If you're shooting right handed, your right eye is seeing the dot & your left eye is seeing the target. The brain puts both images together & you see the dot on the target. Also I believe Nelson was thinking of building an adjustable rear sight, not just a folder, as the rear sight sits very close to the rail.