Weapon Updates & Reviews

It's been a while since I've done any kind of gear reviews and gun updates. There have been a few updates to the AK47 that I built some time ago. I've mounted a standard AK scope mount and fitted picatinny rail to that. On top of it, I've set a Leepers red/green dot scope. I've moved the Famous Maker laser sight off of my PLR-16 (more on that later) and mounted that on my AK. Lastly, I've mounted a tactical flashlight in front of the forearm.

Mounting the side rail was a serious pain in the ass. The rail is mounted to the receiver via three rivets. Peening those rivets is what made it a difficult task. There was no good way to support the head end of the rivet while peening the other end. That meant that the rivets would slip to the inside of the receiver or kink over sideways and jam into the hole which then would seem to be peened tight. After mounting the scope and firing a few rounds however, I would find that the supposedly tightly peened rivets had jiggled loose leaving the scope wobbling around in the breeze. Eventually, I managed to get them tight so they'd stay tight. If I were to do it over again, I would tap threads into the rail and simply screw it tight with flat headed screws and locktite and call it good.

The Leapers red/green dot scope has functioned quite well in this application. I like the ability to switch the color of the dot. Sure the multicolor functionality really is nothing more than grooviness that serves no real utilitarian purpose. The scope zeroes and holds a zero well. The appeture is a little small, but for a rifle it is adequate as it is being fired from a cheek weld. There is one draw back. This scope does not use a standard CR2032 battery like so many others do. It uses a CR1620 which is infinitely more difficult to find and more expensive to buy. So make SURE you've turned it off when you're done using it. All in all though, not bad for a $35 sight.

The tactical flashlight I've already reviewed. It is the Target Sports model that I bought from CDNN some time ago. I love these lights!

I did however find a fault in the Famous Maker laser sight. This sight worked very well on my PLR-16. Initially I had the laser mounted under the barrel in front of the fore arm. Well with the laser mounted directly to the barrel, the concussion of the round going off would jar the laser hard enough that it would shut down out every few rounds. On the PLR-16 it was mounted to the rail molded into the bottom of the forearm and as such it did not have a hard mechanical connection to the barrel. So I ended up moving the laser to the side picatinny and moving the flashlight up front. Now it's more happy. The new position made zeroing the laser an interesting affair, but atleast it wasn't blinking on and off with every round any more.

Well I promised I'd say more about removing the Famous Maker laser from my PLR-16. Here you see my PLR in its current state. I've added a trick green laser to it. Again, this really doesn't have too much of a pratical use. The green laser is just a higher powered laser than the original Famous Maker laser. Zeroing this sight was extremely easy and once it was zeroed and locked down it has held the zero ever since. This still is one of my most favorite guns to shoot and that green dot does raise some eyebrows. I bought this sight from the good folks over at Centerfire Systems. I have always been treated well there. In fact when this order arrived I found a very nice cleaning kit tossed into the box for free!