Yesterday I was doing some trading at a local shop and ended up with a good deal more than I had expected so I decided to pick up the new Romanian Draco AK. It was pretty much a “what the heck” purchase for a “what the heck” kinda gun. While I haven’t shot the gun yet I can say that I am very impressed with the quality of this AK. It’s a good deal nicer than what I have seen with typical WASRs. My understanding is that it’s milspec and of the quality of a rifle built for the military. The one thing that did irk me was that the threaded barrel had a muzzle nut spot welded on making the attachment of a flash hider or muzzle break impossible. I’ve heard that not all of them have the spot weld but I only had one to choose from so I had my work cut out for me.
I’ve read a bit on the topic of muzzle nut removal and I’m seeing some claim that it’s a five minute job with a Dremel all the way to hours of work. After having removed the nut I can see how both might be true. Unfortunately mine fell into the hour plus category. In the photo below (shown wearing a new slant break) you can see indicated in red where the spot weld goes inside the channel on the barrel overlapping onto the muzzle nut. If the spot weld is confined to the area inside the channel it’s simply a job of grinding away the spot weld in between without grinding too much into the nut. It seems the problems begin when the spot weld does outside of the channel out in front of the channel onto the nut and splaying out to the sides, as I have indicated with the two white dots. You may have cleared out the major portion of the weld inside the channel but those two remaining portions of the weld at one side or the other (or both) is going to prevent the nut from rotating. What I finally did was to use a stone wheel Dremel attachment grinding down the weld in front of the channel sides flush with the surface of the nut using the front of the channel as a guide. It really isn’t necessary to grind any of the nut away other than to clear out the spot weld inside of the channel and the corresponding material on the nut itself.
Of course I got stupid and actually removed part of the nut itself out over the threads and panicked when I started to see faint indications of threads in the ground area. I had visions of the threads on the barrel ground flat. The nut wasn’t budging but there was no going back, and at that point I was wishing that I had left well enough alone with the nut. Luckily the threads that I was seeing were on the nut itself, and the threads on the barrel were 100% intact. Finally with the weld cleared off in front of the channel sides the nut came right off. You have to remember to push the springed pin to get the nut moving as it is locked into that pin by a groove in the nut. To loosen turn clockwise. The photo makes the area far more rough than it is, and I could clean it up more, but the cleaning rod fits into that area anyway so it isn’t an issue. To look at it in person you’d never know that anything had been done. Bare metal easily touched up with some Super Blue.
I’ve read a bit on the topic of muzzle nut removal and I’m seeing some claim that it’s a five minute job with a Dremel all the way to hours of work. After having removed the nut I can see how both might be true. Unfortunately mine fell into the hour plus category. In the photo below (shown wearing a new slant break) you can see indicated in red where the spot weld goes inside the channel on the barrel overlapping onto the muzzle nut. If the spot weld is confined to the area inside the channel it’s simply a job of grinding away the spot weld in between without grinding too much into the nut. It seems the problems begin when the spot weld does outside of the channel out in front of the channel onto the nut and splaying out to the sides, as I have indicated with the two white dots. You may have cleared out the major portion of the weld inside the channel but those two remaining portions of the weld at one side or the other (or both) is going to prevent the nut from rotating. What I finally did was to use a stone wheel Dremel attachment grinding down the weld in front of the channel sides flush with the surface of the nut using the front of the channel as a guide. It really isn’t necessary to grind any of the nut away other than to clear out the spot weld inside of the channel and the corresponding material on the nut itself.
Of course I got stupid and actually removed part of the nut itself out over the threads and panicked when I started to see faint indications of threads in the ground area. I had visions of the threads on the barrel ground flat. The nut wasn’t budging but there was no going back, and at that point I was wishing that I had left well enough alone with the nut. Luckily the threads that I was seeing were on the nut itself, and the threads on the barrel were 100% intact. Finally with the weld cleared off in front of the channel sides the nut came right off. You have to remember to push the springed pin to get the nut moving as it is locked into that pin by a groove in the nut. To loosen turn clockwise. The photo makes the area far more rough than it is, and I could clean it up more, but the cleaning rod fits into that area anyway so it isn’t an issue. To look at it in person you’d never know that anything had been done. Bare metal easily touched up with some Super Blue.