Although I'm somewhat of a purist when it comes to preserving or restoring milsurp rifles, I have been known to let loose every now and again. For example, after owning several variants and examples of SKS rifles, I felt the design might lend itself to better accuracy if a few (ahem) modifications were done to the basic rifle. Nothing exotic, just some of the same things that folks do with other rifles to tighten up their group sizes. So when a friend offered me a neglected Norinco SKS for a good price, the wheels were set in motion. The kicker was that he had replaced the receiver cover with a scope mount version that just plain didn't move, meaning that particular variable could be factored out. So I jumped in with both feet.
My aforementioned friend had ground off the bayonet lug, which I considered to be a good start in the barrel harmonics scheme of things. The cut-off disk on my Dremel made short work of the remaining front sight barrel sleeve, leaving a smaller-diameter portion of the barrel hanging out there in front of the gas block.
No big problem there. I've had this Capco, Inc. SKS muzzle brake for a while, waiting for the right time to make use of it. It's made to be sweated on or Loc-Tite mounted to a naked SKS barrel after the front sight barrel sleeve is removed. Voila'!
Since the Dremel was already set up to carve things, I removed the side sling loop off the gas block and cleaned things up there for some touch-up blueing. Of course, that leaves no place to mount the sling on the front end of the gun, or does it? Piece of cake. The cleaning rod hole in the forward stock ferrule just received an Uncle Mike's threaded sling swivel post, with a Nylock self-locking nut on the backside holding things tight. The sling swivel needed a slight flat ground into the side nearest the barrel, but that was accomplished easily. The results look fairly clean, with a minimalistic feel, while also blocking off the cleaning rod hole. For use on the bench, the sling removes easily from the front and back sling swivels.
Since the back end of a standard Oingo-Boingo wood SKS stock doesn't have an Uncle Mike's sling swivel, I had to improvise. So improvise I did. The rifle now wears a Ram-Line synthetic stock, with aforementioned sling swivel factory-installed. Nice, huh?
The real reasons I went with the Ram-Line are rather simple - lighter weight, great ergonomics and length of pull, and plenty of surface area to glass bed the action in all the right places.
Speaking of saving weight, take a look at the gas tube and handguard. Or rather, finned gas tube sans handguard. I wanted to offset the weight gain caused by the scope, mount, and muzzle brake. I think I did it, although I don't have an accurate scale to compare, and the gun is no longer in it's original as-issued trim for the comparison. It feels lighter, and handles amazingly well after the surgeries that removed the front sight base sleeve, handguard, wood stock, and original 10-round magazine. (Replaced with a svelte 5-round zytel model)
The scope is a plain-vanilla Weaver K4, steel tube, fine crosshair. I've found these old scopes to be utterly reliable, and capable of handling hard knocks and autoloader recoil without missing a beat. Nor do they overwhelm the rifle they're sitting on. The 35mm or so objective lens keeps the scope tube centerline lower for a better cheek weld on the stock. It just plain looks good, too.
I've got a steel brass deflector mounted to the rear sight for now, using wiretie zip-straps. It works, but as soon as I figure out how to remove the rear sight tangent from the sight base, I want to drill and tap the tangent and properly attach the brass deflector. The vigorous extraction and ejection of the SKS demands that I protect the scope, even if it is a steel-tubed relic.
As seen in the pics below, the gun is not quite done. I've yet to do the glass bedding of the receiver, and the trigger group is getting sent off to a friend for one of his wonderful reworks. The safety lever is getting shaved down to about 1/4" wide, so the paddle doesn't snag my trigger finger during firing. The pistol grip stock moves one's reach a good bit to the rear, so either I get finger extension implants, or shave the safety a smidgen.
Even though the project has a ways to go, I couldn't resist grabbing a bunch of my 7.62x39 match handloads, and punching some 100 yard targets with the FrankenSKS. I'm not at all discouraged so far, the gun is hovering right at the 1" mark, center-to-center, for 3 rounds. I figure when the glass bedding and trigger job is complete, that'll be 5 rounds inside an inch, then we'll go for adjustments to get surplus lacquered-steel ammo shooting tight groups, too. The funny thing is, even though I hacked up this SKS to make a target gun, it may very well turn out to be a fun Wisconsin whitetail rifle, too. Not bad for a diamond in the rough!
My aforementioned friend had ground off the bayonet lug, which I considered to be a good start in the barrel harmonics scheme of things. The cut-off disk on my Dremel made short work of the remaining front sight barrel sleeve, leaving a smaller-diameter portion of the barrel hanging out there in front of the gas block.
No big problem there. I've had this Capco, Inc. SKS muzzle brake for a while, waiting for the right time to make use of it. It's made to be sweated on or Loc-Tite mounted to a naked SKS barrel after the front sight barrel sleeve is removed. Voila'!
Since the Dremel was already set up to carve things, I removed the side sling loop off the gas block and cleaned things up there for some touch-up blueing. Of course, that leaves no place to mount the sling on the front end of the gun, or does it? Piece of cake. The cleaning rod hole in the forward stock ferrule just received an Uncle Mike's threaded sling swivel post, with a Nylock self-locking nut on the backside holding things tight. The sling swivel needed a slight flat ground into the side nearest the barrel, but that was accomplished easily. The results look fairly clean, with a minimalistic feel, while also blocking off the cleaning rod hole. For use on the bench, the sling removes easily from the front and back sling swivels.
Since the back end of a standard Oingo-Boingo wood SKS stock doesn't have an Uncle Mike's sling swivel, I had to improvise. So improvise I did. The rifle now wears a Ram-Line synthetic stock, with aforementioned sling swivel factory-installed. Nice, huh?
The real reasons I went with the Ram-Line are rather simple - lighter weight, great ergonomics and length of pull, and plenty of surface area to glass bed the action in all the right places.Speaking of saving weight, take a look at the gas tube and handguard. Or rather, finned gas tube sans handguard. I wanted to offset the weight gain caused by the scope, mount, and muzzle brake. I think I did it, although I don't have an accurate scale to compare, and the gun is no longer in it's original as-issued trim for the comparison. It feels lighter, and handles amazingly well after the surgeries that removed the front sight base sleeve, handguard, wood stock, and original 10-round magazine. (Replaced with a svelte 5-round zytel model)
The scope is a plain-vanilla Weaver K4, steel tube, fine crosshair. I've found these old scopes to be utterly reliable, and capable of handling hard knocks and autoloader recoil without missing a beat. Nor do they overwhelm the rifle they're sitting on. The 35mm or so objective lens keeps the scope tube centerline lower for a better cheek weld on the stock. It just plain looks good, too.
I've got a steel brass deflector mounted to the rear sight for now, using wiretie zip-straps. It works, but as soon as I figure out how to remove the rear sight tangent from the sight base, I want to drill and tap the tangent and properly attach the brass deflector. The vigorous extraction and ejection of the SKS demands that I protect the scope, even if it is a steel-tubed relic.
As seen in the pics below, the gun is not quite done. I've yet to do the glass bedding of the receiver, and the trigger group is getting sent off to a friend for one of his wonderful reworks. The safety lever is getting shaved down to about 1/4" wide, so the paddle doesn't snag my trigger finger during firing. The pistol grip stock moves one's reach a good bit to the rear, so either I get finger extension implants, or shave the safety a smidgen.
Even though the project has a ways to go, I couldn't resist grabbing a bunch of my 7.62x39 match handloads, and punching some 100 yard targets with the FrankenSKS. I'm not at all discouraged so far, the gun is hovering right at the 1" mark, center-to-center, for 3 rounds. I figure when the glass bedding and trigger job is complete, that'll be 5 rounds inside an inch, then we'll go for adjustments to get surplus lacquered-steel ammo shooting tight groups, too. The funny thing is, even though I hacked up this SKS to make a target gun, it may very well turn out to be a fun Wisconsin whitetail rifle, too. Not bad for a diamond in the rough!
