AK47 doco.

[JeffinNZ]

Team.

Saw a really good doco on the History Channel last evening about the AK47. Real interesting and quite well researched and delivered.

Mr K surely was/is a clever man. Interesting how he never approved of the AK74 and the change to the smaller 5.45X39 round. He blamed the new cartridge on the Americans......hehe.

I did notice however that whilst the narrator mentioned the very effective muzzle brake on the AK74 no mention was made of the levels of deafness in the operators! I SAID THEY'RE LOUD!

The AK surely is a tremendous advert for loose tolerances. After all the VW Beetle with its air cooled engine was rather generous in the tolerances too and they won't die either.

[floodgate]

Several years ago, the NRA arranged for Mikhail Kalashnikov and Eugene Stoner to meet at one of their annual conventions. GEEZ! would I have loved to have been a "fly on the wall" at that get-together! (My Russian would have been barely adequate, if that, but...)

Ed Ezell's "The AK-47 Story" is still one of the most treasured books in my 500+ volume arms and ammunition library; fascinating information, and superbly written.

floodgate

[9.3X62AL]

That is a good documentary on Mikhail Kalashnikov, I've seen it a couple times.

Goodness knows, the AK-47 WORKS. EVERY TIME. Not the best tackdriving RIFLE on earth, but their's no flies on the CARTRIDGE it fires accuracy-wise.......or the super-accurate benchrest calibers it spawned, like the 22 and 6mm PPC. Of course, the AK-47 comes from a country that designs its fighter aircraft to be able to land in grain fields if necessary, so "robust and reliable" figures highly in the Russian engineering mindset. That, and plagiarism as a perfected art form. The AK is pretty much an original design, though.

[KTN]

Guns,based on AK-47 can be accurate,for example Finnish 7.62 RK 62 and israeli Galil assault rifles will easily beat AK in accuracy department,but maybe not in reliability.BIG country,BIG tolerances.As Dep. Al wrote,theres nothing wrong with the cartridge itself,it is popular target and even pistol silhouette cartridge here in Finland (of course,with tight match chambers and good handloads).IMO 7.62x39 is perfect for it´s intented purpose.Another great gun Mikhail Kalashnikov designed is the PKM machine gun,really a masterpiece of simplicity,considering it is beltfed gun,fireing rimmed ammo (7.62x53R),and it is also very reliable.Russians have a long history of making loose.....errr,I mean reliable guns,like Dektjarev m1927 LMG that was found to be much more reliable gun than Finnish L-S 26 LMG during the Winter war 1939-1940.


Kaj

[JeffinNZ]

I was especially interested in Mr K's comment about the gawl of the Chinese selling 'HIS' design to all and sundry after it was given to them as a gift from the USSR.

He was well pissed off.