Gentlemen,

I would like your opinions on which model you like the best and why. I am thinking about purchasing a M71 at a local gunshop, but I want to make sure the M76 is not the better choice. Thank you for your input.

8416w

Get the M76 if you can find one.

While the M71 is as well-made and reliable as any other Valmet, it's basically just an expensive .223 AK that uses even more expensive mags.

The M76 incorporates the improved Valmet sights, and can be had for not much more money.

And whatever you do, like Templar said, don't get the plastic stock.

I agree with all said..get the M76 before the M71..I have both...and my M71 has the plastic stock  very low quality plastic used in the stock....so I just shoot the M76 folder lots

Thank you for the input guys. How accurately do they shoot?

Quoted: Valmet barrels are NOT chrome lined.

And in case someone is wondering why: they tried but couldn't master the process

Quoted: Wow, that's not the reason I was expecting and it's kind of suprising.

The Sako/Valmet barrels were rifled by hammer forging. This causes some kind of changes in the steel on the inside surface of the barrel and the chrome doesn't "stick" as well as on cut rifled barrels.
For example the Finnish KvKK LMGs have cut rifling and chrome barrels.
They would have been able to chrome the barrels to similar standards as Russian AKs had but of course that wasn't good enough for the Finnish Army, so they decided they'd rather do without it as the standard ammo is copper jacketed.
Also there were some weird personal chemistry problems between the person in charge of the chrome business and other people at the factory etc...

(This based on the couple of pages on the subject in Hyytinen's book "Asesuunnittelua Suomessa")

Stuff like this makes me want to learn Finnish, then I could get a little more out of my Sotilaskiaseet Suomessa books than the pictures and page-long chapter summaries

Quoted: Great info.  The Bulgarians cold hammer forge their AK barrels and then hard chrome plate them....and they're very, very good.

I know, I have a milled Bulgie that shoots 1.5 MOA with Lapua ammo.

I think the "problem" were the completely unreasonable quality standards demanded by the Finnish Army. The tolerances were more suitable for high-end sniper rifles than general issue assault rifles. Of course they are also the reason the Valmets are so highly thought of.
I believe many (most?) of the milled receiver Valmets imported into the US were actually "factory seconds" that were not accepted by the Finnish Army, at least many such milled receivers were used in Valmets imported by Interarms (can't remember which book that was mentioned in).
I'm sure they could have made chrome plating to similar standards as the Bulgarians do, but probably that wasn't enough for the Finnish Army inspectors...

I don't suppose there is an English translation of "Asesuunnittelua Suomessa"?

I probably would have heard of it. The publisher's (Arma Fennica) homepage gives the authors e-mail address: [email protected], you could ask him of course if there are any such plans.

One point I forgot to mention earlier: the cost of the chrome plating would have been very close to that of a replacement barrel, so that was another reason why they weren't so keen on it.