It can be down, but it’s annoying.  For starters you need a parts kit.  Ever since the ATF demanded kits have the barrels cut, the cost of building an AK has gone way up.  After you get the kit you have to tear it all the way down, which involves pressing out pins and removing the remnants of the old receiver.  Throw away the full auto parts, they are considered contraband in Washington (better still, have the person you are buying the kit from throw them away for you).  What is left will be a pile of parts that may need cleaning and refinishing.

After you do that, then you get to decide how to put the gun back together.  You will need to put at least 6 US made parts in the gun in order for it to be legal.  All manner of useful building information can be found at The AKFiles.

In my case I’m opting for US made parts from TAPCO.  Tapco makes a wide variety of gun parts of good quality.  I’m building with a US fire control group (3 parts) a US receiver (1 part, bent from a sheet metal flat, no paperwork involved for a homebuilt receiver) a US muzzle brake (1 part) and a US pistol grip (1 part).  This will allow me to use imported magazines which count as three parts in the gun.

My kit is a 1979 Romanian “G” rifle built for the Romanian National Guard.  I got lucky and the kit was already prepped for a build when I bought it.  While externally in bad shape, the insides look like the gun was never, if rarely fired.  After much scrubbing with steel wool and gun oil, the kit is looking pretty good.  I traded off my top dust cover because of it’s overall poor shape, and ordered a replacement one.  I also have to replace the rear sight due to extreme corrosion.  Someone in Romania did a poor job of storing these rifles at some point in their history!

The picture shows the major parts of my kit after an initial cleaning.  Some work with a wire wheel will finish the job.

Let’s just say I got sidetracked and also got a new project off the ground. The upside is I can go back to using my blog as a personal blog, not a crude attempt at a forum.  The even better news is I do have a forum.  OlyForums is my answer to the lack of serious online discussions in Olympia.  Hosted by the good folks at Everyday Olympia, OlyForums has proven to be quite popular with those who do not make up the far left “progressive” ideology that the only other “community” forum pandered to.

I took down the forums section, as well as the “vermin of the week” which I was simply too lazy to update on a regular basis.  Let’s just call Congress the Perpetual Vermin of the Week and I think everyone will agree and be quite happy.

I’ve gotten new toys which I will talk about later, including an awesome Finnish Model 1939 Mosin Nagant rifle built on an antique 1897 receiver, and am building my very own AK 47 on a Romanian “G” parts kit.

Other than that, I hope to make a regular appearance on my blog again!