Hungarian SA85M, factory thumbhole, factory trigger group, factory sites, 100yds, Wolf FMJ ammo, 2.5 to 3.5 ten round groups, no flyers, using standard Army M16A2 zero targets. That is the best I have ever fired with an AK, I wasn't really trying to shoot my very best, just screwing around getting the feel of a rifle I had just bought. I have never really tried for accuracy on the AK, but I don't imagine that you would be able to do much better than that with any Ak without some pretty intensive accuracy mods at the cost of reliability. There are several reasons that the AK is not as accurate as other rifles foremost having generous chamber that will gobble anything you can jam into a mag, tightening up the chamber would be great improvement in accuracy but then you would get the same ammo finnickyness that you get with AR types rifles.

Quoted: Quoted: Hungarian SA85M, factory thumbhole, factory trigger group, factory sites, 100yds, Wolf FMJ ammo, 2.5 to 3.5 ten round groups. ...That's a damn good grouping.

For me it sure as hell is. As a matter of fact it was my first trip to the range shooting lefty (I had always been nearly as good left handed as right, but this was the first time I had no choice). I had just been diagnosed with sub retinal hemoraging which was easy enough to stop using a photreactive dye, and a laser, however the doctor could offer me no explanation of why it happened, and told me that the loss of center vision in my right eye (my dominant) was permanant. I have shot nearly as well with a preban SA85 that I have, and with my Romanian I can normally keep groups under 5 inches, but he asked for best accuracey ever with an AK. I have found that the commie guns shoot more accurately with commie ammo, I use a SAR1 to hunt deer with Winchester XX and while I have never missed a shot with it, I really wich that I could find some real hunting ammo from Eastern Europe. This fall an uncle and myself are going to hand load some ammo, and see if that doesn't help.

As far as an AK's accuracy is compared to an AR, I don't think it is nearly as accurate, but for any field work from deer hunting to street fighting, any situation that requires the use of a carbine type rifle, the difference in accuracy just isn't going to matter.

4", round figures, with open sight equipped poly technologies legend series. this was a 5-shot slow fire group at 100 yards. the ammunition was russian, but i forget the headstamp.

typical groups for that rifle were probably in the 4" to 6" range.

2-3/4", 5-shot group from my sar2 with a pso scope and a redstararms fire control group.

typical groups from this rifle are in the 3+" to 5" range. the ammunition normally used is barnaul.

For 7.62x39 my first 5 shots for groups in my AMD63 with Barnaul fmj were 3moa with irons and an 8" bull. This spring I made a 1.5moa group with my stock 223 Saiga, 8x scope, 2" diamond target, Wolf hp. Never close again with that ammo but it was sooo cheap...  Broke the 2moa barrier several times with a Bulgy 5.45, 3.5x scope and Barnaul fmj.

if one compares a rack grade ar15 with a 16" bbl. to a military ak (both have crappy tiggers, the ar has better sights and more consistant ammunition) the ar will generally outshoot the ak by an inch or two at 100 yards. at 300, it will be more evident that the ar's ammunition and sight design will show a definite improvement in hit percentage.

at 200 yards, i see little practical accuracy difference between the two designs.

of more importance is that as my eyes get older, i appreciate optics more and more. with a scope mounted and dialed in, the so called accuracy gap between the two rifles narrows considerably.

in a nutshell, the ak will general not be as accurate as an ar and the ar will never be as reliable as the ak.