Well as some of you may have read in previous posts, I have drilled, ground, epoxied, filed, sanded and generally had way too much fun with my 56. After all is said and done this is what I've discovered;
The SKS can be made into a respectable shooter. I halved the group size by bedding it and doing the trigger.
The modifications that I think were most worthwhile:
Trigger polish, file sear to make it single stage and moly lube.
Glass bed receiver. (I still want to bed up near the cross bolt and see if that improves things even more but will have to wait until I'm off crutches for that).
Grind the rear of the receiver to control the ejection of spent casings. There's something very nice about watching them all go away at 2:30 and not bouncing around and raining down on you and your shooting buddy's heads.
Weaver Convert-A-Mount fixed scope base. Nice and low, quickish release. Combine with a leather lace on cheek rest. What more can I say.
What I didn't find very useful was drilling the gas tube.
If you are shooting reloads and are wanting to collect the brass then this mod is a reasonable thing to do. However once drilled out to the point that re-loadable casings are easily collected there is so much gas pressure vented that the bolt will not reliably cycle surplus ammo. Surplus ammo has far too many variables built in to each load (lacquer thickness, quantity of bitumen sealer used and crimp not to mention weight of charge) that by the time I drilled to the point that 50% of the surplus rounds were not cycling, I was still flinging my Lapua brass into the bush. I'll find them when the snow goes.
I have made a decision that my SKS is a plinker. I want a centre fire semi auto that I can shoot a whack of rounds a day for $0.18 each. Is it going to be my go to hunting rifle? No. I have a Mauser 96 in 6.5x55 and a Win 94 in 30-30 for that. That being said I still will have some loads on hand using Hornady SP and Barnes TSX just in case, but the brass used will be considered expendable.
With that in mind, I have just ordered a replacement gas tube from Marstar for $16 ++.
YMMV of course. These are just my observations. And what do I know. I mean really.
CT
The SKS can be made into a respectable shooter. I halved the group size by bedding it and doing the trigger.
The modifications that I think were most worthwhile:
Trigger polish, file sear to make it single stage and moly lube.
Glass bed receiver. (I still want to bed up near the cross bolt and see if that improves things even more but will have to wait until I'm off crutches for that).
Grind the rear of the receiver to control the ejection of spent casings. There's something very nice about watching them all go away at 2:30 and not bouncing around and raining down on you and your shooting buddy's heads.
Weaver Convert-A-Mount fixed scope base. Nice and low, quickish release. Combine with a leather lace on cheek rest. What more can I say.
What I didn't find very useful was drilling the gas tube.
If you are shooting reloads and are wanting to collect the brass then this mod is a reasonable thing to do. However once drilled out to the point that re-loadable casings are easily collected there is so much gas pressure vented that the bolt will not reliably cycle surplus ammo. Surplus ammo has far too many variables built in to each load (lacquer thickness, quantity of bitumen sealer used and crimp not to mention weight of charge) that by the time I drilled to the point that 50% of the surplus rounds were not cycling, I was still flinging my Lapua brass into the bush. I'll find them when the snow goes.
I have made a decision that my SKS is a plinker. I want a centre fire semi auto that I can shoot a whack of rounds a day for $0.18 each. Is it going to be my go to hunting rifle? No. I have a Mauser 96 in 6.5x55 and a Win 94 in 30-30 for that. That being said I still will have some loads on hand using Hornady SP and Barnes TSX just in case, but the brass used will be considered expendable.
With that in mind, I have just ordered a replacement gas tube from Marstar for $16 ++.
YMMV of course. These are just my observations. And what do I know. I mean really.
CT
, I myself have put some $$ into my SKS, but mostly some tacti-coolness, I saw a guy who really flipped his SKS around, took off the front sight it was tacti-cool to the max
