[Gman]

You got some great craftmanship and skills, thanks for sharing.

 

[65cobra]

Awesome build perfection as always maybe the selector markings changed in the 2000 kits between this one and the one I received. Don’t go pulling your receiver apart

 

[Vlado]

Shoutout to @AK-John for doing a superb barrel population and head spacing of the receiver.

After more research, and thanks to Cobra for posting his 94 with selector markings still present, I decided to put the SAR ones on this one. John graciously welded over the FF FA markings and I have an etch I will be using to add the markings.

The rear trunnion has also been drilled and dimpled and awaiting rivets.

 

[65cobra]

Great work John, and Vlado, you are awesome. Its truly amazing your dedication you put to making these 100% correct. I am both sad and glad I am not that dedicated

when you etch consider making the S tilted, Ill try to clean mine up a little better

 

[Kingcornchip]

Everyone misses the tilted S.

Sitting on a few stencils with tilted S that I had weaponmark make custom when he was still doing stencils.

 

[AK-John]

Cant wait to see what you have in store for the finish on this one! Cool project and amazing attention to detail!

 

[65cobra]

I dunno doesn’t look very tilted

 

[Vlado]

Thank you all. Cobra, much appreciation for those clear stub markings. The S is certainly less canted on these 94's than on earlier Sadus/Cugir's, but still a very slight cant nonetheless. Will be very helpful when I etch tomorrow.

 

[65cobra]

I wonder if it’s worth trying to cut the leg of the r while you are at it?

 

[Vlado]

To be sporting, I attempted to cut-off part of the R leg on the selector markings and quite pleased with the result. Thanks to Cobra, again, for providing an added observation. I decided to somewhat interpolate between earlier Sadu's with a very canted "S", and the almost straight one on Cobras stub. The result is an extremely slightly angled "S" when viewed straight on. I probably spent more time than necessary on the markings, but now we are ready to move on to the final VladTech™ on the receiver and call the rifle complete. Would like to thank our friend @Thor's Hammer for providing the stencil etch.

 

[65cobra]

Simply amazing as always!

 

[Kingcornchip]

Looks good. I think sometime in 1994 the S become slightly less tilted. There were two rifles from 1994 posted on here at some point with SAR markings and one was tilted and one was less tilted as seen above. So I'd imagine that's the year they "fixed" it.

What type of finish are you planning to use on the receiver? The eternal Romanian question. My electron dispersion analysis on a demilled receiver (Thick-font pointed-A "S FA FF" marked from Apex) almost guaranteed bluing as it lacked phosphorus or phosphorus compounds ruling out parkerizing. BUT I emailed century to ask about the current import WASR finishes and they said parkerizing. So Romania either switched at some point (The MD86 rifles from the late 80s and early 90s REALLY look parkerized) or the guy from century just guessed. And this is all just assuming Sadu followed suit with Cugir's finishing... I know Nova modul's website says they use bluing.

If anyone could get Cugir to actually respond to emails you'd be my hero haha.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

Great work and documentation. I have a 1992 Sadu kit made about 200 serial numbers later than the one featured in the video. Machining is rough, but not a rough as the one in the video. I need to do a bit more research myself, but I believe the '92 would have the thick/bold font selector marks S, FA, FF.

Looking forward to seeing the final results on your '94.

 

[Vlado]

Thank you all for the continued feedback and discussions. The FF/FA markings are still correct for 1992 Sadu rifles. After getting these kits, and having photos of known 1992 rifles, its obvious they changed sometime between 92-94 to the SAR markings at Sadu. Nailing down a date is hard to do sadly. I have yet to see a 1993 Sadu kit of any pedigree. Hopefully one will surface from this latest batch with clear receiver stub markings present. Its a bit comical that we're spending so much time trying to clone these junker 90's rifles to a 1:1 level but thats the fun part isn't it.

Thor, I thought that '92 in the video was rough when I made that video. That rifle looks like a perfect Soviet AKM compared to this '94. Really kept going downhill year by year at poor old Sadu.

The final steps to complete this rifle have commenced. We start by verifying rear trunnion dimpled holes and adjusting as needed. Once proper, flush, fitment is achieved with the two rear rivets, we crush them into place.

I was not happy with how one of the rivet heads formed, so I drilled it out and re-crushed using a new rivet to be satisfied with the result.

 

[Vlado]

At this point, the rifle was functionally completed and a test fire of 20 rounds was carried out. Perfect, tight mechanics and crisp gassing.

At this juncture we broach the finish on the receiver. Although the quality of the parts on the kit were quite abysmal, they were still mostly new old stock, just with a lot of handling wear. Because of this, the receiver needs to have a similar dark black/blue bluing to start, and then worn in to match the rest of the other parts.

To clean up the receiver and rivets, along with the etchings, prior to bluing, a a quick pass of 180 alum oxide is sprayed on the receiver alone. We aren't painting the rifle so we don't care about degreasing beforehand. Acetone will be used right before the actual bluing to rid those pesky oil stains around the rivets. The goal here is to be as sub-par as possible, just as Sadu would have it 28 years ago.

I decided the best way to achieve the base I am looking for was to cold blue it by hand. I spent 3 hours last night doing each side by hand, and then the internals, 4-5 times each with full cold water rinses between to prevent rusting. This is the first time I've done the full process and it will be the last. Very time consuming but it gave exactly the nice, deep black/blue finish I was hoping for as a base. As it stands now, it needs to be blended to match the rest of the OG parts. Here are photos for record. A very light pass of steel wool was used to highlight the high points such as rivets and spot weld edges. An achilles heel of any metal thats been welded and cold blued, are the weld artifacts of the heat differential between the metals. You can see this highlighted on the selector markings, where we originally welded over the FF FA markings that were stamped on the receiver. These will mostly disappear once some matching is carried out on the receiver, but it still looks exceptionally nice in my opinion.

 

[65cobra]

Wow that cold blue turned out great. Almost a shame to beat it up

 

[Kingcornchip]

I always wondered if the early md90s were intended for Romanian military service then sent to Croatia instead due to lack of availability to meet their demands for export. Then as they caught up (post 1992) the SAR markings were added to the Sadu md 90s because they WERE intended for export. Just thoughts

Cold blue (not the oxypho copper compound depositon) does look really nice to match the finish. If I can ever find an early 90s receiver piece I'll have an EDS analysis done to see what the finish is supposed to be. So far I've only tested a 70s(?) stub.

 

[AK-John]

That finish is amazing!

 

[Vlado]

I always wondered if the early md90s were intended for Romanian military service then sent to Croatia instead due to lack of availability to meet their demands for export. Then as they caught up (post 1992) the SAR markings were added to the Sadu md 90s because they WERE intended for export. Just thoughts

Cold blue (not the oxypho copper compound depositon) does look really nice to match the finish. If I can ever find an early 90s receiver piece I'll have an EDS analysis done to see what the finish is supposed to be. So far I've only tested a 70s(?) stub.

Thats an interesting theory and very well could be true. To make things even weirder, the 2010's production Cugir export AKM's now have the FF/FA markings added back. I almost could not believe it when I first started seeing them like that in other parts of the world (thats my next project BTW). At the end of the day, I would be hard pressed to believe Romanian really cares all that much about AK production and the finer nuances such as selector markings. It could be as simple as they've worn out the SAR stamps and went back to using the FF/FA ones they had on hand.

The 1994 Junker is now complete. Did minor weathering on the receiver and added a bunch of fingerprint oil, and will let the rest of it wear in naturally with heavy use. This is the Chevy Malibu of the AKM world. A true no-frills utilitarian piece that does the same job as any higher quality Communist AK pattern rifle.

As a Christening present, the gas tube wood decided to split down the middle after the first few shots. The Sadu gift that keeps on giving 28 years later.

 

[Vlado]

Part 2