AK Sponsor
Posted: 3/30/2005 9:01:46 AM EDT
|
I got started in this a few moths ago, spent countless hours doing research on the internet before I even started building. Thanks to this site and a couple others, I was able to succeed. So, this is my way of saying thanks for all the information, by sharing what I have accomplished. There has been a lot of good information here , as well as a little bad. I will share what I have learned from all this. After building these and teaching a few friends, I have pretty much all the bugs worked out. Little tricks and secrets that I have learned from trial and error I will share with you all. First here are the pictures of my latest builds. http://flamingsphere.homestead.com/files/ak_betternickel.JPG Yes, that is bead blasted nickel, and I plan on doing the barrle, sight blocks, and trigger guard and magazine next pistol. The bolt and carrier and trigger group I am hesitant to do hing built using AMD-65 kits. start life as a grade C or "pretty bad looking) kit. Most of the finish gone, sometimes a few dings in places. 1. Grind off the rivets sticking out of the front trunion. use a punch to knock out the two bottom rivets after you grind them flush. Leave the front four rivets in there for now. 2. grind the rivets flush on the rear trunion. Put it in a drill vise and drill out with a 3/16 cobalt drill, go all the way through. Use LOTS of cutting oil from Ace Hardware, stop often to add more and clean out chips. IF you knock the rivet out first or drill it out with smaller bits then try to use the 3/16 then the hole will be undersized BAD. So, leave that rivet in there, and drill it out to 3/16 the first time through. Leaving the rivet in somehow helps the hole be a full 3/16 diameter. NOTE we will be using 3/16" x 1 1/2" rivets for this part. 3. time to fit the parts together. First, OOW receivers do not fit these parts as is. SO, I take a belt sander, with 80 grit belt, and turn the receiver upside down. There are three places to remove metal. In front, sand down the lips that should slide into the front trunion grooves. they are to thick, stick in to much. Take off a little at a time until the receiver just about slides in there easily, use a file to clean up the burs and check the fit again. I like to use 120 grit belt for the final fitting, it leaves a nicer finish. The front is fitting good, right? 4. the rear trunion don't fit either, so turn that receiver upside down and grind down the rear lips that should slide into the rear trunion. That won't be enough. You will also need to take a little off the bottom of the rear trunion, and round it's bottom edges where they touch the receiver. After you get it fitting just about right you may notice the rear trunion is still to tall. I just lay the whole thing on a flat metal surface, and beat the rails into the trunion slots. they will bend right up into there. It is either that or you must grind down more of the underside of the rear trunion. 5. Just in front of the rear trunion lips the receiver is square on top, round those edges so the receiver cover will be easy to fit over the receiver. Those square edges make setting the top cover a pain. Give them the same curve as the rest of the top of the receiver. All done. Some people like to install the trigger guard now. Others do the front trunion. BEfore you do anything permanent, decide if you would rather modify the selector stop or the selector because one it to big to allow the safety to fall into the safety detent in the receiver. 6. put the front four rivets in the trigger guard, put it in a bench vice upright with the rivets resting on the jaws, the jaws will act as an anvil, and the vice will hold the trigger guard in place while you hold the receiver. Put the spacer on the trigger guard and put the receiver on top of it all. It helps to have a second set of hands at this point (but not required) put your "rivet tool" inside the receiver, on top of the rivet shanks that are sticking up, and beat the living doo doo out of it with a BIG hammer (or a rock, or whatever you have handy h 7. carefully make a template for the trunion holes. A clear piece of plastic would be easiest. The hard way is to measure and stuff. I use a credit card with holes drilled in it. Put an empty magazine in the mag well, and push the front trunion into the receiver as far as it will go with the magazine in. Look at how far it went in. With an OOW, it goes in past the front of the receiver about 1/16" or so. Now take your template and punch the holes. Drill the magwell rivet hole first, using a 1/8 drill bit just on one side, next use your 3/16 drill bit. drill all the way through the receiver and trunion for the MAGWELL HOLES ONLY keep going all the way trough until you come out the bottom. You want to go all the way through. IF you want, you can stop just before you go all the way through and finish the hole from the opposite side. Now, put a long rivet all the way through this hole. so you have one long rivet where two will be eventually. This is to hole the front trunion rock solid in place while you drill the remaining holes in the front trunion. 8. ok, now for the front four holes in the front trunion. IF you are like me, and don't want to mess with head spacing, etc....using the 1/8" bit again, drill a pilot hole into the receiver and into the rivet. Be sure to NOT drill into the barrel. check depth often. After you get the four pilot holes drilled, use the correct drill size for whatever tap you will be using. I use 6mm X 1mm button head Allen, some people use other sizes. I like the bigger 6mm size, it give more surface area for recoil forces to be absorbed on. Use lots of cutting oil, and go slow, be a minimum of Cobalt drill bit. I use a 3/16 drill for this, which isn't the perfect size, but it does work. There are some tricks to this part. The rivet will often start to spin as you get to the bottom. the rivet will cause chatter, and about half the time it will not spin. You can use a chisel made from a drill bit to cut up the rivet, if you can't cut it all the way, you can use a punch to flatten it back out and drill some more. chop, punch drill, repeat. Cut shake, clean beat, etc. until that rivet is mostly out of the hole, or at least out of the way. if you can't get all of it out, don’t worry. You can take a 1/8 drill and drill carefully into the rivet at an angle to break it up. you can also grind flat a 3/16 drill bit and us it to cut up the rivet without drilling the barrel. This is a art form, and different for every rivet. Sometimes the rivet will get pushed over to the side of the hole, out of sight out of mind. Just make sure it won't interfere with the tap. And often a little bit of rivet will fall out after you tap the hole. for the tap, I use a normal tap, grind it down a little so the threads can engage and go for it. After the first tapping it is time to bottom out the holes. take that $2 tap, put the tip in a vise and it with a hammer, breaking off the tip, now belt sand with 120 grit to make it all pretty (go slow and dip in water often to avoid heating it up) sand a slight 45 angle on your new bottoming tap h It is best to not leave the receiver on the trunion while you tap (at least for the first two front holes) You CAN tap the front two separate, then screw the receiver on there tight, and then tap the middle two holes with the receiver assembled. This gives a perfect fit for the middle two trunion holes... if you don't clamp or something the receiver may catch the tap first and get bend outwards BAD BAD BAD. the best way is to just tap that trunion separate from the receiver and just go back later and drill clearance holes in the receiver. TO tap these holes, it is BEST to clamp the receiver to a drill press, and put a BIG drill bit in the chuck. use the drill bit as a pivot point for your tap, it will old the tap vertical, and prevent broken teeth holes. ( don't ask me how I know) you can use the drill press to press the tap into the hole as you turn it. remember, for tapping it, use lot of good cutting oil, (not just any oil) and forward 1/4 turn, back 1/5. Go slow, and be careful to NOT break your tap. if you see the tap flexing, you are about to break it. That tap will twist a little before it breaks. I usually get 4 full turns before hitting bottom. sometimes 3 1/2 (on a 6mm x 1mm) ok, now that you have to holes tapped.... 9. screw that receiver on there tight. Rivet the mag well rivets on the front trunion. remember we are using larger 3/16" rivets. My method it not the best, (I would like to use the modified bolt cutter method on day) But it is cheap. Take a bar of cold rolled steel (I use the trigger guard rivet tool for this... dual use. I used my skill saw with a metal cutting blade to cut a notch in the cold rolled steel, to clear the mag well lips. Shorten those long rivets down to about the same length at standard rivets for the job. I set the rivet in the hole, and put the head on your anvil with the divot in it (or a flat surface here. 10. Now comes the crucial part. insert the rear trunion, and fit the top cover. find where the trunion needs to be, by using your top cover. Remember, it is better to be to short that to long. It is easier to grind a little length off your top cover than to add length. after you find where it needs to be, look at how it is oriented with he rear of the receiver. use a pointed metal thing to scratch inside the receiver a line showing where the trunion needs to be. I have found it is easiest to clamp the rear trunion to the outside of the receiver, using your made to line it up. use the 3/16 drill bit and drill a SMALL mark into the receiver using the rear trunion as a guide. OR you can measure and mare and pray... LOL after you mark the holes this way, put the trunion back inside the receiver and drill a 1/8" hole using the marks you made. drill through ONE SIDE ONLY. IT is easy to verify the hole location before you drill... DO SO. measure 20 times, drill once! now, you have a pilot hole to prevent walking, drill all the way through the receiver and rear trunion and out the other side of the receiver. Insert a rivet (don't hammer yet) and drill the second hole. insert a rivet, and check your top cover. IF you are off a little, it had better be "top cover is to long" or you will be in a world of hurt. ok, everything is fine now right? get out your anvil with the divot near the edge, and start the fun part.... wacky that rivet. if you hit off center, it will flare the shank more. if you are hitting perfect, the rivet will slowly expand and it will end up looking like a saiga factory job rear rivet. ok... OOW receivers have a few places you MAY need to adjust. in the front, the lower rails may need to be bent downwards VERY slightly, because of the way we sanded down the top of the receiver, etc. I use a flat head screw driver, and give it a slight tap to bend them just a LITTLE BIT. it doesn't take much, that metal is soft. The top rail, in the rear, where the bolt head is inserted during assembly... use a file to shape it. hold the AK facing forwards, and angle your file down, so you file the underside of the rail where the clearance cut is. you will know it because when you put the bolt it the gun, and draw it back, lift up on the cocking handle as you slowly ease the bolt closed. you won't go far when the rear of the bolt carrier will hang up on the top rail where the notch in the bolt carrier. fill the rail to a 45 ( vertical) and file the bolt carrier the same, so they cannot bind there. you ma need to do the same to the left side too. 11. grind/sand off a little from the bottom of the safety so it works correctly. That is about all. I will post some pictures of these problem areas soon. I hope this helps. hippie.gif |
|
After I wire brush most of the finish off and polish etc, I spray on water soluble degreaser (orange scented h |
|
this is fun, I just learned how to post pictures! hock.gif I build this with a hammer froma tapco flat. It has some issues, like sometimes it hangs up on closing during firing. It doesn't do it manualy cycling, I still have some kinks to work out (or scrap it and try again han http://flamingsphere.homestead.com/files/ak_homebuilt.JPG next time I'll use the dremel and weld technique to bend em.. or break down and buy/make a press jig |
|
here is my only global arms build, I used their new 1mm receiver. Negatives:The axis holes had bad burs (normal for these) and over all the quality of metal work was lower than OOW. It didn't have a safety stop slot ( I drilled a slight divot for that). neg and pro...the heat treatment made it almost imposible to punch for drilling the holes. That metal is HARD. Pros: The color was nice (is it blued already?) and it was nice to not have to modify the safety to fit. I didn't have to file on the top rails. The front tang placement was fool proof. just slide it in till it stops, no mag needed to space it (Although you should alway use a mag.http://flamingsphere.homestead.com/files/ak_global.jpg both global and OOW have their pros and cons. Here is apolish I built from a OOW. bayonet lug, threaded barrel, USA trigger group, stock and grip and slant break. http://flamingsphere.homestead.com/files/ak_polish.jpg |
Great post, I think that you are hooked now like the rest of us. Like I say to the guys that I work with when they ask me why I like building AK's better than AR's, " It takes a bit of talent to put together a AK from a kit, a monkey with a barrell wrench can put together a AR" Now if I could gust get a bit of talent!!!!!
|
I'm waiting on a brushed nickel AK pistol, I am having everything except for the bolt assembly and trigger group plated. I'll post pictures as soon as I get it back from the plating shop.  I really have no idea what it will look like. they didn't have a sample at the shop, but the AK metal is realatively smooth alread, so after brushing is "should" have a almost mirror finish.. maybe... we will see... 
|
AK Sponsor