A guide to act as checklist for potential AK buyers or those who wish to determine the exact condition of the AK they own. This guide is split up into two sections. The first one details the basic inspection of an AK pattern rifle. The basic inspection can be done quickly and does not require any disassembly or tools. Basic inspection will tell you that the gun is functioning properly. The second section is for an advanced inspection, which requires a few tools and will be a more comprehensive look at the quality of the gun and reveal any minor areas of concern. It requires that you know the function and names of each part of the gun, how to fully disassemble it, and is overall more suited to those who are familiar with the AK platform.
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Tools you may need:
• A magazine you intend to use with the rifle • An optics rail you intend to use. • Flashlight • AK parts diagram • Ruler • Digital caliber • Headspacing gauges (For the respective cartridge the AK is chambered in)
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BASIC INSPECTION: • For the love of god, make sure the AK is fully cleared before inspection! Do this by removing the magazine, pulling the charging handle back and making sure there is no cartridge inside the gun.
• Look over the entirety of the AK and make sure it is not critically damaged. Does it have all the correct markings and parts? Is the finish clean and uniform or rusted and pitted? Is the furniture in good condition? Some outside wear is acceptable and can even give an AK the "battlefield pick up" (BFPU) look you may desire. Also note that there will always be a long curved scratch in the receiver under the selector lever unless the gun is totally brand new. If any of the essential metal parts are severely cracked, chipped, dented, bent or otherwise malformed it’s probably not worth buying, and could even be hazardous to shoot.
• The stock, barrel, rear sight block, gas block, and front sight block should all be be completely straight without canting to the side or being rotated to the left or right. Hold the AK out with the muzzle forward and view it so that your eye is looking directly down towards the muzzle from behind the very back of the stock. Make sure to close your eye that it not directly behind the gun. It is common for all AKs to have a very slightly canted barrel or barrel blocks. Especially the front sight block. A canted gas block isn’t too much of a problem if it doesn’t interfere with the movement of the gas piston. However, if you plan on mounting an Ultimak rail, this may cause problems.
• Inspect the rivets on the outside of the gun. They should not look squashed around the edges, asymmetrical, nor riveted so hard as to cause dimpling in the receiver. To check for gaps between the rivets and the receiver, try sliding a piece of notebook paper under the rivets or hold the rivets up to a light and see if any light shines through the space between the rivets and the receiver. They should all look uniformly pressed in and flush with the receiver. This includes the often overlooked rivets on the trigger guard. A perfect AK should have no gaps between the rivets and the receiver. Low end guns will often have slightly inconsistent rivets, but they shouldn’t be totally mangled. If the rivets look like they’ve been put in with a sledgehammer or totally half assed, it is a major red flag.
• Function check the weapon. As you are doing so, the action on the charging handle should be smooth, the hammer should cock easily, and the trigger pull should be consistent. If you feel the action of the charging handle binding, make a note to later check the gas tube, piston, and receiver rails for any damage. It may not be a big deal, and just a result of a new trigger that needs breaking in, but it could also mean there is an issue with the rails, piston, or gas tube. Of course, if the AK fails a function test, it is not fully functional and not safe to shoot.
AK Function Test:
1. Move the selector to fire. Pull the charging handle fully aft and let go so it flies forward. The AK should now be in battery. If a magazine was inserted, a cartridge now would be loaded and the hammer would be ready to be engaged by the trigger to fire a bullet. 2. Move the selector to safe. Try to pull the trigger, and make sure it does not engage. Obviously, the trigger should not function on safe. 3. Move the selector back to fire and pull the trigger while holding it to the rear. You should hear a click as the hammer drops. 4. While holding the trigger to the rear, cycle the charging handle again. This step should cock the hammer back once more, allowing for semi-automatic fire. 5. Slowly release the trigger. You should feel and hear a click as the trigger resets. 6. Check that the hammer has been retained by pulling the trigger again. The hammer should fall once more.
• Try pushing the front sight adjuster to the left and right using only the pressure from your fingers. The front sight adjuster is the circular drum just below the front sight, and should not move at all under these conditions. If it does, it will most likely begin drifting under recoil.
• Check the function of the detent plunger on the front sight post. The pin should be easily pushed in with your finger and spring back out when let go. If it is jammed and unable to move, it will likely make the next step in this process impossible.
• Inspect the threading at the end of the barrel. Hold the detent plunger down and unscrew the muzzle device to view the threads. If the threads are damaged, the muzzle device may get stuck or be difficult to unscrew during this step. If the plunger does not work, it can be replaced with a cheap spare part.
• Check the retaining pins on the bottom of the front sight post and gas block. These are the small pins that hold both blocks onto the barrel. They should be tightly and evenly fitted without extending too far out on either side.
• Lift up the rear sight leaf and make sure it does not wobble left or right. Snap the sight back down and make sure springs into place with some force. Both the retaining spring and the rear sight leaf can also be easily replaced, so this is not a complete dealbreaker.
• Make sure the magwell is uniform and center with the receiver. You can do this by eye or use a digital caliber to make sure the mag well is cut not too far to the left or right.
• Test the AK with a few different types of magazines if you have some on hand. Please make sure your magazines are empty! All magazines should easily rock and lock into place. Different magazines not working with the gun is the number 1 complaint people have when buying a new AK. 7.62x39mm AKs are designed to have a moderate amount of magazine wobble, and problems are more likely to arise with the magazine being too tight than the magazine being too loose. The opposite is true of 5.56 and 5.45 chambered AKs, which should have little to no magazine wobble due to using a smaller cartridge.
• If you intend to use the optics rail, make sure it is totally parallel with the top of the receiver. If it is not, any attached optics will become misaligned. You can use a ruler to make sure that the top of the optics rail is equidistant to the top of the receiver along its entire length. If you brought your optics rail mount, go ahead and test it to make sure it locks into place and sits evenly.
• Inspect the stock. It is very important that the front of the stock is parallel with the back of the receiver and that there are no cracks visible on the stock where it screws into the rear trunnion. If either of these signs are visible on an AK, it’s likely that the rear trunnion has become crooked. The exception is shitty the balsa wood stocks Century puts on all their imported guns, which are made of recycled popsicle sticks and are often fucked up on any used gun. There might be a small gap between the stock and the rear of the receiver, this is normal and by design.
• If the AK has a folding stock, make sure that it smoothly folds from one position to the other and securely locks in place. A slight bit of slop or wiggle when the stock locks is normal. Also, a note about underfolders, the stock should be able to change positions without getting stuck on a seated magazine, so check that too.
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ADVANCED INSPECTION (DISASSEMBLY REQUIRED): The following steps require you to disassemble the gun so that the dust cover, spring assembly, bolt carrier, bolt, and both upper and lower handguard are removed. There are plenty of videos on YouTube showing you how to do this, so just make sure you watch those before trying it yourself.
• Look over all the serialized parts to see if they match. Matching parts are seen as ideal due to manufacturing variations, but are not entirely necessary for a good functioning AK.
• Inspect the bolt and bolt carrier for any flaws or damage. The tail of the bolt carrier may be slightly squashed if the AK has a high rounds count, but should not be totally mushroomed out. The piston may wobble slightly, and this is normal, but the retaining pin attaching the pistol to the bolt carrier should be fully intact. All the edges of the bolt itself should be sharp and not folded over or worn smooth.
• Check for any wear inside the gas tube or on the gas piston head. Severe wear on these parts can indicate that they are interfering with the straight movement of the bolt carrier, and it could cause problems down the road. If the bolt was binding during the function test, this step is especially important.
• Look into the little space in the front of the receiver, below the barrel and behind where the lower handguard rests. Sometimes this area is rusted, which can be a sign that the manufacturers rushed the finishing process.
• Look inside the receiver from the top down. None of the internal surfaces should be cracked, chipped or otherwise misshapen. An AK that’s been poorly stored or maintained (especially if its previous owner shot it with corrosive ammo) could have pitting in the chamber. Also, pay extra note to the front and rear trunnions. If the rear of the receiver looks beat to shit by the bolt carrier, this can also be a bad sign.
• The rivets on the inside of the AK should be nicely formed without bulging too far into the receiver, especially in the mag well. Bulging rivets in the magwell can damage your magazines.
• Seat a magazine into the gun and look at the rails running down the inside of the receiver. These rails should be straight and not bulge in or out while also being perfectly parallel with the magazine’s feed lips.
• Inspect the bore with a light to make sure that it shows no signs of pitting or damaged rifling. If you wanna be fancy you can use a borescope.
• Before you reassemble the gun entirely, give the chamber a headspacing check with some gauges. An AK should never chamber a “No Go” gauge.
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Final Words:
• If you’re looking for a bottom tier AK that still works reliably out of the box, then you can tolerate some overall flaws. However, under no circumstances should you buy an AK with bad trunnions. This is an issue that will almost guarantee malfunctions and bad headspacing while also being one of the most difficult to fix. This is one reason why you should do your research and never buy an AK with cast trunnions. Look for the signs of crooked trunnions by making sure the barrel and stock are not massively canted, as well as making sure the riveting on the trunnions is not wholly messed up. During an advanced inspection, look out for obvious damage or mishappeness when inspecting the trunnions from the inside of the receiver.
• The most important areas that indicate the overall quality of the gun have to be the rivets and pins. The more uniform these are, generally the higher quality of the manufacturing.
