Huh, didn't know that.

the only reason the RPK barrel is so long is to transfer heat even slower than usual for automatic fire and to fit the long underfolding bipod under the barrel as seen in the picture I posted

Vepr's are semi-auto only so even though it has a shorter barrel, you'll never heat it up like you would an RPK

Yeah, bipod's gotta be a decent size to get clearance for the 45 round mags

"70rd drums"

I've heard bad things about the drums

hahaha

I could talk about RPKs and Veprs all night long since Veprs are my favorite guns and I know them inside and out, lol

It must be nice living somewhere that doesn't ban importation of Russian and Chinese guns

when RPKs were first developed, they only had the 70rd drums. they developed 40rd magazines for them much later to increase reliability

the 40rd mag is very long, so when a Russian troop is prone in the dirt, they have to dig a hole for the magazine to sit comfortability in as the weapon can be stable on the bipod

I knew it!

It's that or crouch

Also seen a few guys fire with the bipod resting on a kneeling comrade

the RPK-74 has straighter 45rd mags so they have that problem even more

Yeah, that's the one I was thinking of

You familiar with the PSL, the DMR the Romanians developed from the RPK since they didn't get the Dragunov?

yeah I'm not interested in that thing, not even a little bit, lol

I'm not a Romanian collector, and there is a lot of problems with the PSL system

Ah, it seems intersting to me

I have a long barreled vepr chambered in .308. it is basically a PSL except higher quality and cheaper. the only thing going for the PSL is that it is a military collectible

Oh well

I've heard good things about it, but we're pretty starved of any decent AK derivatives here in the states

so the PSL is just an RPK receiver with AKM parts slapped onto it, chambered in 7.62x54R. it has a longer gas tube too

I dream of someday building the most accurate AK I can

Just because

it has a thin pencil barrel, thinner than an RPK or SVD barrel. So a PSL barrel heats up fast and shifts POI fast whereas my vepr and an SVD will outshoot a PSL every day of the week

So even a few rounds will make it off?

it varies by how hot it gets

metal bends and expands when it gets hot, the hotter it gets, the more inaccurate it will be, the more the POI will have shifted

if you want to build the most accurate AK in the world, Definitive Arms gives you really really tough competition

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9h224abV6PM

They modified a .308 Vepr (similar to what I own) and made it more accurate than an SVD

it's completely unreal how much high quality custom work they did to this Vepr

damn

I was thinking along the lines of taking a shitbox AKM and seeing what I could do with it, but that thing is impressive

an AKM is not the most accurate AK in the world, it's not even close. 7.62x39 out of a thin barrel just isnt accurate at all outside of 400 yards

Yeah, that's the idea

Doing as much as possible with the worst starting point possible

the most accurate AKs are long barrel Veprs in .308 or 30-06, IMI Galils in .308, and IWI Aces in .308

very high quality, very expensive non-traditional AKs