I bought a Chinese SKS in the 90s for $125ish. It was a short barreled Paratrooper model. The original stock was way too short for me so I put it into a Choate(I think) polymer sporter stock. I gave it to a friend about a year later. He put an ambidextrous safety on it...he's a southpaw...and a compact, inexpensive Chinese scope on it. The trigger was atrocious, the worst I ever felt. He had a gunsmith work on it and the trigger is still very heavy but smooth and breaks crisply. Its reasonably accurate and has functioned without any problems for several hundred rounds of cheap, steel cased Russian ammo...He has used it as a deer rifle...I wish I had kept it but we are best friends and usually shoot together so I've shot it as much as I wanted. .