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Posted: 4/2/2005 5:36:55 AM EDT
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I am finally getting around to replacing parts in my thumbhole stock SA-85M so I can put a pistol grip set on it. I am now looking at replacing the front top handguard. It looks like there is no way to remove the wood and replace it with a matching piece from the new set. The metal pieces appears to have been tack welded. I cannot move them at all. As a last resort, I am going to replace the lower front hand with the original and try to refinish the buttstock to match the front pieces. Anyone have any other suggestions? Are these parts normally welded in place? |
| I have never seen any AK with the handguards welded into place. You normally have to loosen the keeper at the front of the lower HG to get it off. Have you verified that your SA85M uses regular HG's, there were some imported with the thumbhole stock that were built with short handguards and used a gas piston/tube from the AMD65. |
I am able to remove the lower front handguard by a lever that locks it into place. The upper front handguard section is removable from the gun with the wooden piece fixed to the gas piston tube. There is a cap that is slid down the front of the tube that presses in the top wooden handguard. The cap appears to be tack welded to the piston tube. If I look inside the tube, I can see the spots from the weld. The rear section of the tube looks like it also permanent. If I had to guess the typical design, I could see that cap being able to be slid about 1/4 of an inch up the piston tube to give enough clearance to replace the handguard. I've tried to force the cap to move and it won't budge. I may try to post pictures later this evening when I get home. |
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I can't see it, but from your description it sounds like a standard AKM gas tube with two flanges welded to it (front and rear). The flanges are open at the bottom (barrel side). The AKM upper handguard is reduced in diameter to fit under the flanges - make sense? They are installed and removed by putting the part of the gas tube without wood in a vise (I usually put some scrap leather over it to prevent scratching.) You can actually vise that thing good and tight and it will not bend or crush the tube (but have a care!). Put something on top of the wood to protect it from the next tool... I usually use channel-lock pliers to simply grab the handguard and rotate it 180 degrees around the axis of the gas tube, then you just pull it out. Re-install the same way. Caution! Caution! It is possible to crack your handguard, but this is how standard AKM handguards were installed and removed. I have cracked one during installation by failing to sand enough wood off the ends so that the fit was too tight. Usually if you can get it into place upside down (fully engaged) it will rotate pretty freely - you may have to tap it in or sand a bit. If I recall correctly I placed the pliers in such a way that it would be less likely to crack and I had good contact on the flat/bottom of the handguards. I hope this helps. PS what are you doing with your old, presumably blonde wood handguards? |
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Thanks lots guys. That has to be my answer. I will check that out this evening. I kinda feel dumb for asking the question now, but I just couldn't picture how to change these things. OODA_Loop, I hope to not break the handguards, but I'll probably hang on to them just to keep the original parts. |
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www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=4&f=64&t=68973 Tacked thread at the top of this forum explains it all. |
Sorry about that. I usually hang out on the ar-15 side. 
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Hanguards on the short tubed SA-85M are identical in length/size/shape to the regular model. Only the piston and tube are shortened. |
No worries.........welcome to the Darkside! |
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