... on my SAR-1!  

Got some white and some red fingernail polish from Wally World for cheap the other night, borrowed some remover from Morgan, and after just a few minutes of work was rewarded with this:





Its amazing how long the fingernail polish will last, too.  I find that its pretty much impervious to any cleaner except Gun Scrubber, it wears quite well.  I did my FAL quite awhile back with similar results.  Remember that its often the details that seperate a really nice rifle from an ordinary one!

EDIT:  looking at the pics just now, I realize that I missed the line underneath the "P" on the sight.  Back to the gewehr room once again!

That's real nice. How did you apply it?

Not bad at all.  

Is that the original SAR finish? or did you refinish the gun?

I applied it with the little brush that comes with the fingernail polish in the lid.  The smell of the polish and the little brush reminded me of using Testors paint on models when I was a kid.  Once I was sure that I had full coverage inside the lower area, I dipped a q-tip into the remover and swiped it very lightly across the surface of the raised area to remove excess polish.  The trick is, don't let the q tip reach into the lower area of the letters and remove polish where you want it to be.


The gun has been refinished, its a matte blue over parkerizing.  The gunsmith I had do it isn't doing that sort of finish anymore.  How he used to do it was, he would parkerize the part to be refinished and then, having removed it from the park tank, dip it immediately into the bluing tank.  Since the parkerizing hadn't cured yet, you got a blue on top with a tough parkerizing underneath.  Unfortunately, in doing this, over a period of time he accidentally parked the inside of his bluing tank and ruined his bluing salts, which cost him alot of time and money to fix.  

He has my SAR-2 now with instructions to do a full-gloss blue finish, alot like what you'll see on those really nice Polytech prebans.

Here is a "glamour" pic of the entire SAR-1 taken awhile ago:



And my FAL, in what he calls a semi-gloss.  I can't wait to see what a full-gloss looks like, underneath this is a $450 Century gun!








EDIT:  People don't realize two things about the SAR series of Kalashnikovs in this country:

1. With a little TLC they can be a very nice Kalashnikov for much less than you would spend on a preban or on an Arsenal Bulgaria type gun.  No it won't ever be a preban or an SAM-7 classic, but I'm not spending $700 either, even after the refinish (did the wood myself with sandpaper and tung oil) and the Red Star trigger.

2.  Just because these things only cost $300 right now doesn't mean they are worthless or that they will always be worthless.  There was a time when people were sporterizing 1903 Springfields because they only cost $20, and shooting corrosive ammo through $40 M1 Garands.  More recently, alot of people weren't bothering to clean their $75 Chinese SKS's, and leaving them behind the seats of their trucks and such, because they'd never be worth anything.  Those guns, in proper condition, have now tripled in value in just a few years.

Its no secret that the SAR series is dead-- Century (temporarily) has lost their manufacturer's license over a receiver flap with the BATF (similar to what happened to Interordnance) and the seller of the parts kits used to build the guns has triped the price on them before Century even gets them into the country,so they've stopped buying them.  The rumor mill says that some smaller manufacturers are going to pay the new premium for the kits and build them in much smaller numbers, probably selling in the low $400s instead of the low $300s.  In a few years these guns, which were legally sold in an "original" configuration with pistol grips and everything, will be selling for $600 at gunshows.  Everyone who didn't bother to buy one (or two, or three!) or who had one and let it sit and rust, is going to be crying their little gun-lovin' eyes out at what an opportunity they missed back in 2000-2003.

Damn! that SAR looks sweet.  

I should have been more direct in my approach to my SAR.  

Instead I messed around and tried to do everything myself and now I can't justify spending another nickel on it, and it still looks crappy!

Oh well, I got my Krebs 74 and my new AK-USA AK-103K to keep me happy, so the SAR gets to be the "rental" gun for my friends when we go shooting.  

So what did you tell the folks at Wally World when you came to the counter with two containers of fingernail polish?

You’re rifle looks great.

I’ve been using spray paint (don’t have to explain the fingernail polish) but I’ll bet there’s a lot of different ways to get the job done.

Best Regards, J

JTR8541, the main reason I won't do the lettering like you did is because on the SAR guns everything is etched and rather poorly at that, so highlighting it wouldn't add to the look of the gun at all.  Good job though.

Also, by pure coincidence I was in that section of Walmart that night to buy an economy size pack of Trojans.  So when I went to the counter, I had the biggest box of Trojans that they sell, two shades of lipstick, and some Cheezits.  The girl behind the register didn't even blink, they must see some weird stuff there.

Campy:  I just went to look at the name on the bottle and the name of this shade is "perfect cherry".  Huh huh, huh-huh-huh...

Duke, you should have grabbed the gallon jug of vasoline,and a teddy bear just for a little shock value!

Hey CAMPY, what do you think of my SAR series rant in my second post edit?  Is my finger on the pulse or am I way off base or what?

$600 in a few years?  Hell, thats what they want for Fun Shows around here Right Now!

But I didn't know Century wasn't making them anymore... interesting.

Don