Some of you may have seen the ad from Cotswold Arms recently
advertising a CO2 version of the AK-74 assault rifle. The
urge took me so I bought one -
The rifle itself has made by Izhmash stamped on it, the people
who make AK-74s for the Russian Army, however the internal
mechanism is actually made by Baikal. In fact the internal
mechanism is in fact a Baikal target pistol, that is held
in place by the stock and the rifle barrel. It can be
removed and used seperately.
It's a rather clever design but it is not exactly the
cutting edge in terms of accuracy. The barrel of the pistol
and the rifle appear to be smoothbored. You can use either
.177 air pellets or 4.4mm steel ball bearings in it. I
had my doubts about using the pellets so I bought some
of the ball bearings. These are the same as the ones
used in the CO2 Makarovs. The rifle barrel is the
hollowed out cleaning rod under what you think is the
barrel but in fact is just a steel rod with an uncut
chamber.
Loading is exceptionally complicated. The grip is removed
as per any other CO2 pistol and you insert the bulb and
tighten a screw at the bottom of the grip. To load
the BBs is the tricky bit. First you basically field
strip the rifle as per a Kalashnikov, i.e. remove the
top cover, remove the recoil spring and bolt carrier
(which serve no purpose at all other than to make it
look realistic).
Then inside the frame of the receiver is the pistol,
which has a reservoir on top that you fill with BBs.
This leads into a rotating magazine arrangement very
similar to that used on the Umarex guns like the CP88
and CP99. You manually rotate the magazine to fill
the eight chambers. However, unlike the Umarex guns
you can fill the reservoir with up to 23 BBs, and as
the magazine rotates it picks up another pellet.
This is rather clever and means you can fire 23 shots
without reloading. And then you put it all back
together again although you don't have to, unless
you want to shoot BBs while being totally authetic
in appearance!
The trigger pull is single or double action, but with
the pistol inside the rifle frame you can only fire it
DA.
Accuracy in the rifle was pitiful, about 10 inch groups
at a distance of 3 yards or so. Let's just say it lives
up to its name (who picked "Junker" I wonder?)
If you take the pistol assembly out of the rifle it is
rather better, the gun comes with an attachable sight
so you can use the pistol seperately. Accuracy out
of the shorter barrel of the pistol was much better,
pop can accuracy at 3-4 yards. Actually I was thinking
for the CO2 pistol competitions the UKPSA does this might
be quite good. Cocking the gun to SA is also very clever,
there is basically a button at the back of the gun that
you press in. It has a much better trigger pull than
the Umarex guns, which isn't saying much.
Muzzle energy was doubtless higher than an airsoft gun,
the manual says 3 Joules. The metal BBs also don't
richochet like the plastic ones used in the Japanese
airsoft guns.
With the pistol assembled into the rifle, it looks
exactly like an AK-74 except for the pistol grip and
trigger. I have a deactivated AK-74 and a lot of the
parts appear to be interchangeable (including the
furniture, bolt carrier, compensator and op rod tube),
but not the magazine (which is purely cosmetic on the
Junker). I think this has been done for the US market,
otherwise someone could buy one of these and an AK-74
parts kit and have an automatic rifle. The gun has the
full auto selector switch on the side.
They're imported into the US by Kalashnikov USA, which
is stamped on the side.
In the manual the rifle is described as a "souvenir"
which is what it is as you couldn't use it for anything
serious.
The sights are graded out to 1000m, rather funny, until
you find out that the sights have to be cranked up to
600m to hit a pop can at 4 yards.
Anyway, if you've always wanted a Russian Kalashnikov
and don't want piles of paperwork this would appear
to be the product for you!
Steve.
Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org
List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
___________________________________________________________
T O P I C A The Email You Want. http://www.topica.com/t/16
Newsletters, Tips and Discussions on Your Favorite Topics
