sks upgrade/update

[jagen heie]

awhile back i picked up a cheap sks in a cheaper stock. the thing was held together with wood screws. bought it knowing i was gonna switch out the stock. i was looking at the pistol grip/ collapsable stock but then i saw a bullpup stock i thinki might get it. its from sg works so if anyones had experience thatd be helpful. other than that im going to update springs and the such.

im looking at a murrays firing pin. 20-30 round detachable mag and a new recoil spring. anyone have advice on other parts i should look at replacing while i have it apart

 

[GatorFarmer]

I Tapcoized one a while back. Fitting was necessary and each mag had to be hand fit. I actually had better luck with the Promag 30s which seem to have improved. Ky base gun was a Norinco. The end result was satisfactory. Thouth even with the extended mag release it was not all that easy to load and unload. I could have adapted it to take non duckbill mags...to load with the bolt closed etc. Some people cut the bbls and put AR flash hiders on. All that seemed more troublesome and expensive to me than it was worth.

 

[Ivan the Butcher]

Williams makes a peep sight to replace the rear blade, woked very for me. Ivan

 

[sheepdawg]

SKSs work best in their original configuration. Nothing is quite as depressing as an as issued Russian bubba'd up by someone who just didn't know what he had. Norincos, Yugos, well if you must add aftermarket things these are the ones to do it with but if you wanted an AK you should have bought an AK.

 

[Arik]

What sheepdog said!

Most of those aftermatket mags are problematic and the new furniture is 99% of the time cheep plastic junk.

Why change the firing pin? If it functions fine you dont need to upgrade springs. Most of these rifles function just fine even after years of heavy use by their respective countries.

Also DONT add a scope to the top cover. 1) it will be very high up and you would need to lift your cheek of off the stock 2) the caliber itself is not 1moa. 3 ) the top cover is ment to keep dirt out of the action and will NOT hold a constant zero. It WILL move around slightly while you shoot and every time you take it off you'll have to re zero. Especially if its a cheap scope setup.

But in the end if you do do your conversion and decide later to sell you'll need to find someone who wants a very cheap "tactical" rifle. And i mean cheap.

I recommend you find an original wood stock from someone who wants to Bubba their SKS and throw that on instead. Then take the stock you have now, use it as target practice, burn it and bury it!

A few years ago i was at a LGS browsing and saw they had a mint Yugo SKS for $250. I like the rifle but i have plenty of AKs so i didnt need it. A few days later i walked in again and there were these 2 kids holding it and talking about what "upgrades" the were gonna do. Folding shock, detachable mags, scope, ...all that good stuff. As soon as the kid put it down to think it over i grabbed it, gave the salesman $50 and said "hold that for me". Im a regular there so they had no problems with it. A week later i bought it even though i didnt want it really. A few months later i gave it to a good friend for hid birthday! He's from Yugoslavia and i knew he would appreciate it.
Sent from my DROIDX using Tapatalk 2

 

[Trooperdan]

Good on you Arik!

 

[Kelly Green]

Sorry to rain on your parade but I hate to see people butcher a rifle, shotgun or handgun to satisfy the need for a “Rambo” type weapon. Trying to make a weapon into something it wasn’t meant to be is often more costly and less reliable than buying what you really want.

I have an old Romanian SKS with original sling and bayonet. It shoots accurately with the iron sights it was given and a 10 round magazine is quite adequate in my opinion.

The old SKS is a good gun in the brush when hunting hogs. If I wanted to defend the world I would buy a modern tactical weapon.

 

[LVSteve]

I'm not big on new fangled stocks on old guns, but given the sorry state yours is in right now I am more relaxed about it. Original SKS stocks are available but there are subtle differences in the way the guns were made and not all wood stocks will swap from one to another.

I have seen the bullpup stock conversion for the SKS and it it something a little different. It does give you more options to mount a small optic than the original and it has a certain cool factor.

 

[relic]

Ditto what sheepdawg and Arik posted about cover mounted scope, mags, and stocks. BTDT.

Not to jack a thread, but since some SKS guys are looking, can anyone direct me to an ambi safety. It'll have to come out of someone's parts box. All the web suppliers are out of stock for a long time. Thx

 

[Arik]

They have aftermarket ambi safties? Really? I never bothered to look.

 

[Fishslayer]

Keep your bolt squeaky clean & you shouldn't really need the Murray FP kit. Shake the bolt & you should hear the FP rattle back & forth.

Thanks to forum member Frank237 I was able to upgrade my Russian refurb from this...

To this... 1951 Tula stock. I've since acquired a semi matching handguard so it looks even better now.

 

[relic]

SKS Ambi Safeties

Arik, I've talked and emailed Dave here: David's Collectibles SKS Stocks

And I've checked a couple web sites for nearly two years. SKS forums have ambi threads. Many guys looking. Stock is scarce and mfg. is uncertain. I keep looking.

 

[1911a2bphil]

Someone, not sure who, makes a Monte Carlo stock for the SKS. This is a hunting stock and is very comfortable to shoot. The length of pull on the original pallet wood stocks are not for American shooters. This might help you.

 

[dcxplant]

I bought an SKS about twenty five years ago, and it was unused surplus, all gooey. Perfect wood.

I was in my 20's and did what a lot of kids that age do, something stupid, and tried to make an AK out of it. I wish I had it the way it was originally. It sure did shoot better stock than after my mods.....

Well at least I'll be able to school my boy; growing up I was the only gun nut in the family. That's my defense and I'm stickin' to it!

 

[Kinman]

I think as long as you use an SKS much in the manner it was designed and keep it as simple as possible the better off you are. I had no idea there was an ambi safety available for them, the safety has always been one of the buggaboos about some SKS rifles. The inherent design is reliable, rugged and cheap...keep it that way and you will be a happy SKS shooter. Whenever you try to improve on the design or add stuff like a scope you will find the rifle will rebel against your sense of tyranny. I agree with a previous reply, if you want a magazine firing AK, get an AK. Its amazing how fast you can load an SKS with stripper clips with a little practice and a Chinese bandoleer. I appreciate the slightly better accuracy potential of the SKS and with ballistics that are about the same as the old 30-30 they make excellent truck guns. The other thing the SKS has over the AK is balance, I think they balance more like a rifle and with the longer sight picture make for a better overall survival type rifle. I'm still looking for the right deal on a birthyear Tula SKS myself...

 

[Tennjed]

I like to tinker, and I am no kid. I do have a Norinco SKS that I have put Tapco stocks and mags on. Runs flawless. I always hear the "if you want an AK get an AK" thing. It kind of rubs me the wrong way. You can't get an AK and change it around as cheap and quickly. The SKS is a cheap gun and there are a lot of them. Keep the matching numbered Russians original, but don't get up in arms over someone having fun with a $250 run of the mill surplus rifle. This gun hobby is supposed to be fun. Don't take it too serious

 

[Frank46]

I tried once to mount a leapers scope to my sks. What a big waste of time. The set screws for the mount wouldn't even scratch the bluing on my chinese sks. Scope mount kept moving. Could not get anything like a group. The mount I think had 4 set screws piece of junk. So off it came. The sks stripper clips work best if you polish off the heavy parkerizing with 400 grit silicon carbide paper. Frank

 

[GatorFarmer]

I liked my Norinco better as a weapon once it was Tapcoized.
The only thing that moderately irked me was that all the mags had to be fitted. I sold it to a Navy Lt. who wanted it more than I did. I did not lose any mooney. Every SKS that I have had sold faster with mods than without and I did not lose money on any of them.

It is not cost effective for a nation state to convert SKS rifles en masse comapred to just buying AKs or even ARs. The economics versus utility are different for an individual.

 

[Mike7.62]

I bought a Norinco in 1990 for $80. I mean, what true gun looney could walk away from an $80 carbine? The original wooden stock was made for someone at least a foot shorter than I (I'm 6'4"), so I put a Ram Line plastic stock on it. It works very well and actually fits me. The accuracy is somewhat better than the AK, but not much due to the horrendous trigger, but it does run without issue with every type of ammo tried. In the last 22 years the eyes have gotten older and the open sights have become harder to use, so last year I experimented with a few things. The previous poster was correct about mounting a scope on the dust cover. It's pointless. However, there is a scope mount that fits into the rear sight block, but allows one to re install the open sight at will. I found that there are no quality scout or extended eye relief scopes that would fit and allow proper ejection of the spent round, and all of these scopes affected using the stripper clips for reloads. It does however allow the use of a red dot sight without problem, so I mounted a Vortex on it and it has worked fine. The mount doubles as an open sight if you remove the red dot, and you can sight it (the mount) in prior to mounting the red dot, then use the red dot adjustments as required to zero. The link for the mount is here:

http://scoutscopes.com/index.html

I bought a second Norinco SKS last year, just because I wanted a second for spare parts should I need them, and the price was considerably higher, on the order of $300. But, adjusted for inflation over 21 years, it actually cost the same, especially if you break the price down in ounces of gold or silver, but I digress. On this SKS I decided to try a peep sight that mounts through the rear dust cover pin holes in the receiver. It also works well, and gives you good eye relief and all of the advantages of a receiver sight, for those who are familiar. You do have to remove the barrel mounted rear sight, but again, you can replace it when you want to. The link for these sights is here:

Tech-SIGHTS Precision Shooting Accessories

Here are two options for those who think that "bubba-izing" milsurps is sacrilege may use to enhance the "shootability" of the SKS, without permanently destroying its original configuration. It worked for me. YMMV.

 

[relic]

SKS Ambi Safety

After my post yesterday, I again emailed Davids Collectibles about the ambi's his P/N - PAR-SKSAMBI $9.99
SKS Part
Surprise! I got a response today. They do expect more stock and offered to contact me when whey become available.

Maybe if more of us show interest, they may get on it quicker.