Sks

[Toney]

What is a good china sks really worth With all those yugos out thier at only $99-149

[Johnch]

All depends on the buyer


I have a slant eye SKS that I bought for $ 69.99
Stock was junk but it shoots great


Johnch

[Jumptrap]

The SKS is a much maligned rifle/carbine/weapon when mentioned in public. Seems folks either hate it or love it.

My pal beagle hates'em. I think they're the neatest thing to ever hit the surplus market. In fact, a few years ago, the SKS was the firearms buy of the century. I recall buying brand new Chinese guns, 10 to the case with all the accessories for $549.99. Anyway you cut it, that is 55 bucks for a brand new .30 caliber semi-auto rifle. No, that wasn't freight additional...they paid the haul bill when you bought a case.

I still have the first Chink gun i bought, circa late 80's and I paid the handsome sum of $129.00 for it. Soon they started pouring in by the thousands......hundreds of thousands I imagine, as it seems everybody had at least one. The prices kept falling until Slick Willy (the perrenial favorite of the Liberal BJ's in the Oval Office crowd) banned importation of Chinese surplus arms. I cannot help but to think the firearms industry had a big hand in that. "Keep that **** out so we can sell more $500 plastic stocked bolt rifles. And here Bill, take this $500,000 and buy yourself a new suit...that one has dried white splotches on the crotch."

ANYWAY...back to the SKS; I have shot a bunch of them and day in and day out, the Chink guns outshoot the rest. My keeper is one of the infamous 'pinned' barrel examples and after at least 10,000 rounds, the barrel refuses to fall off. I kept one Russain made example.....it has better machining, but won't shoot with the Chinese guns. Any SKS brought in from eastern Eurpose is a clone of the Russian guns and i imagine they may have even bought a lot of finished parts from the Russians and used their own slaves to assemble them. In the US, our prisoners make license plates...over there, they assemble guns and the worst provide target practice for the finished product..hehe!

Your Chinese SKS is worth no more than somebody will pay for it. It has no special value.

[StarMetal]

I agree the SKS is a neat rifle. It sure has alot more power then the 30 carbine. A few things I don't like about it is it's heavy for the round it uses and it's extremely long because of the long receiver and again long for the round it uses. They are utterly reliable and brute strong.

Jump

If we lived closer I'd let you shoot my Yugo, it's very accurate for what it is. The Yugos may be Russian copies, but they are so with beefer parts all the ways around. Some Yugo's have the grenade launcher too.

Joe

[Ed Barrett]

Around here China guns go for about twice what others go for. I don't see why but they do. I like the Yugos, the gas cutoff and the unchromed barrels make better cast shooters. All the Yugos I've tried shot Cast very well to excellently, even the ones with not so pristine bores. The Chromed bores are good for shooting mil-surp corrosive ammo and cleaning once a year with a stick and dirty rag but they never seem to smooth out for me.

[StarMetal]

All the rifles that I have that have chromed bores clean exceptionally well including cast and jacketed. They feel as smooth as ice when running a patch through them and the ones I've shot are pretty darn accurate shooting too. I love them. I like my Yuko SKS even if it isn't chromed.

Joe

[brimic]

The Yugos are nice and very solidly built guns. The only weak spot on them is the gas shutoff valve that can erode and/or corrode if not maintained properly. The one I have is really suprised me in how accurately it shoots.

One thing about the Chinese SKS's that gives them an advantage over the Yugos, is that you can put a folding stock on them without breaking any laws. SKS's fall under the semiauto import ban, but the yugo is considered a curiosity or novel design and falls under C&R classification. In order to legally switch to a folding stock, or large cap magazine, you need to play the semi-auto numbers game, where a certain number of the parts need to be American made in order to legally modify the rifle. The chinese Norinco imports IIRC are grandfathered in, whereas with a Yugo, you would need to spend a good amount of money to replace enough parts with american made aftermarket parts.

[RugerFan]

I have a Norinco SKS that I bought new in 1994 and its junk. Accuracy is so-so and it would double fire and slam fire. I bought a new trigger mech which curred the slam fire, but still double fires. Maybe I just got a lemon. Having said all that, it is fairly amusing to shoot. Coming with a short stock, it worked very well for my son (12 at the time) in taking his first deer at 70 yards. The long creepy trigger pull isn't the best for new shooters though.

[StarMetal]

Brimic

You could say the same thing about a gas shutoff valve on any rifle like the FN LAR' s for example. Not a weak point in the least in my opinion. If it were neglected enough to corrode, other neglected parts would give up the ghost also.

Joe

[Jumptrap]

[QUOTE=RugerFan]I have a Norinco SKS that I bought new in 1994 and its junk. Accuracy is so-so and it would double fire and slam fire. I bought a new trigger mech which curred the slam fire, but still double fires. Maybe I just got a lemon. Having said all that, it is fairly amusing to shoot.

Should you decide you want to sell that junk gun for junk price, let me know.

Doubling would be a trigger problem as the trigger group contains the entire fire control mechanism. The slam firing may be due to using soft primers.....meaning ammo other than mil-surp or the CCI military type primers in your reloads. I have read several reports of this, but never experienced it in the 20 or so SKS's that have passed through my hands. The SKS firing pin is not spring loaded and inertia evidently can make it pop a standard primer...causing a double. Pull the firing pin and look at it...the point should be very blunt...it's made that way on purpose. perhaps your FP is too sharp.

If you still have the old trigger group, I'd like to have it. put a price on it.

The SKS is very easy to make rock and roll and very easy to maintain. If the dung ever hits the fan and I have to head fer the hills.....I'd miss all the pretty guns I own, but for day in and day out ruggedness.....the SKS will be my choice...it's the Commie Timex.

[Scrounger]

...it's the Commie Timex... Well said.

[StarMetal]

I think there is a situation if you don't install the firing pin correctly it can slam fire. Not sure, I'll have to search for it again. Like Jump said doubling is no doubt the trigger group problem. Maybe the way the rifle was machine or perhaps interferance from the stock is not letting the trigger group seat correctly into the receiver??????

Joe

[Jumptrap]

I think there is a situation if you don't install the firing pin correctly it can slam fire. Not sure, I'll have to search for it again. Like Jump said doubling is no doubt the trigger group problem. Maybe the way the rifle was machine or perhaps interferance from the stock is not letting the trigger group seat correctly into the receiver??????

Joe

Joe,

The pin only goes in one way...peasant proof! Just think about it for a moment, the design of that little gun. It has no bolts or screws, needs no tools to break down to field maintinence. The comrade (Simonev, I believe) whi designed it knew the average Soviet conscript was a peasant who knew little beyond farming wheat and potatoes, never seen a gun before in his life except when the Commisars came to execute somebody for divulging State secrets on Vodka consumption.

The FP just floats in a milled slot with a straight pin to retain it. The hammer smacks it in the ass to fire the cartridge and it otherwise flops back and forth on it's own volition. A man with 20p nail and a file could make a working replacement.

[StarMetal]

Mark,

This is what I referring to:

JAMMED FIRING PIN (MOSTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR EMPTYING MAGAZINES): There is one main reasons why a firing pin gets jammed in the bolt: improper maintenance. If the bolt is filled with cosmoline and fired, the burnt powder and grit turns the cosmoline into an even thicker paste. Eventually, the paste gets so hard and baked in that it freezes the firing pin in the full forward position. A clean, oil free bolt is a must. However, the best intentions can work against a shooter. While cleaning the bolt assembly, did you properly reinsert the pin? Some Chinese firing pins can be inserted upside down, so when the retaining pin is replaced it jams the pin forward. Perhaps the firing pin was accidentally bent while out of the rifle. This can jam the pin as well. A properly cleaned and maintained firing pin should rattle inside the bolt and fully retract when correctly reassembled.


I don't know how many of you know, but the original original Russian SKS's had firing pin springs. Why they decided they didn't need them anymore is a mystery. Anyways there is a conversion for your current pin to put a spring on it, or you can buy a pin already to install.



Just look up SKS FIRING PINS on Google.



Joe

[brimic]

ou could say the same thing about a gas shutoff valve on any rifle like the FN LAR' s for example. Not a weak point in the least in my opinion. If it were neglected enough to corrode, other neglected parts would give up the ghost also.

Yup. I've seen a few of the $99 'heavily used' grade yugos in sporting goods store with the valve carboned or rusted up tight though. I have an unissued one that I don't really see any need to worry about failure with.

Incidentally, I got to shoot a norinco yesterday. A couple of guys I work with went shooting, one of them had a norinco, we traded guns for a few magazines full. Its a cute and handy little gun compared to the heavier and bulkier Yugo.

[brimic]

http://www.murraysguns.com/sksown.htm


I don't know how many of you know, but the original original Russian SKS's had firing pin springs. Why they decided they didn't need them anymore is a mystery. Anyways there is a conversion for your current pin to put a spring on it, or you can buy a pin already to install.