Opinions.

[Me]

Recently I have found myself thinking about trying to trade my ar15 for an ak74. While I have never owned an ak 5.45 I have tended to favor my 7.62 and .223 romy's in both reliability and apperance. So if anyone has got an opinion on this let me know. Thank ya

[five40five]

Keep the AR but buy an AK-74 anyway.You can spend $400-$800 depending on how deep your pockets are.There is tons of good advice on these forums and they have helped me with my choice.I only had $500 to spend,and made what I think was an informed choice of a Rough Rider by Lancaster Arms purchased thru Atlantic Firearms,but only time will tell when I can take it to the range and shoot it out.Read as much as you can and aks all the questions you need,it's your money,but just remember,opinions are like a** h**** everyone has one and they usually stink...good luck

[warhound]

I own an AR and a 74. If I had to ditch one of them it would be the AR without a doubt.

I have owned several 7.62 AKs, and not one of them was as sweet a shooter as my Tantal. 5.45 is still (somehow) remarkably cheap. If you are thinking about getting a 74, the time to do it and stock up on ammo is most definitely running out.

[Me]

Yea. I'm gonna try to sell it to my boss's brother. If he'll give me what I'm asking I should be able to buy one a decent optic of some sort and plenty of food. So who knows may be with alittle luck things will pan out.

[gewamser]

Think about this, nice and fun as they are, no army in the world, not even the Russians are seriously considering adopting the AK-74 as a future purchase, but MANY are still in the proces of adopting the M-16 family.

[veprk5.45]

Originally Posted by gewamser

Think about this, nice and fun as they are, no army in the world, not even the Russians are seriously considering adopting the AK-74 as a future purchase, but MANY are still in the proces of adopting the M-16 family.

WTF

Less typy more ready,seriously!!!

[five40five]

I don't know...maybe close to 70 million AK's have been produced and how many billions of rounds,that's enought for 1 in every 5 people in this country.It doesn't matter if any one will adopt it there are too many out there and they are always looking for ways to improve,upgrade,change or replace the M-16 though they may never be able to due to politics,logistics of replacement or retooling.The initial cost of purchase for the average person is about 1/2 that of AR's then there are all the add-ons.You can buy/build an AK-47 and an AK-74 for the price of one decent AR.

[Drago]

When I joined the army in 1986, the Cold War was still on. We used to joke that if a war broke out, we'd grab the first AK we saw and throw the M16 away. The M16's back then were finicky bastards and any little bit of sand or debris rendered them useless, unless you field stripped them, cleaned them out. That's fine, if you have time, but not in the middle of a firefight. For a long time, I still liked the "look" of an AR, but I've grown to love the AK's looks AND prices. I can have two decked out AK's for the price of one average AR. Ammunition is less, too.

Just my $.02....

(edited to add) Yesterday I ordered 2 WASR10C's...Total cost with $10 fee per gun handpicked, shipping and FFL = $780.00. Try to do that with an AR!! Oh, I also ordered 2000 rds of 7.62x39 and with shipping it came to $480.00 ($80.00 of it was shipping). That's still $.24 a round..

[Archivist Dick]

Me, you are welcome to the AKFiles. Visit and post often.

You ask for opinions. Actually, I can offer a fact or two based upon experience.

Do not join those gun store commandos who poo poo the 5.45mm Soviet cartridge. There's lots of blarny circulating on the net posted by folks not in the know. That is a very serious, practical round we are talking about with close to three decades of service under its belt. Resistant at first to adopting it myself, field trials several years ago totally changed my mind; we cut down trees with it. At 2/3 the power of the old 7.62mm Soviet round, it matches in penetration and offers that unusual and totally useful terminal-ballistic flip that takes the tar out of any target.

Out of a -74 or Tantal style carbine, the 7n6 and commercial analogs is not low-impulse ... its as close to a no-impulse proposition, muzzle break or no break, imaginable. Shooting such a rifle alongside an M-Forgery will prove to you the Combloc gun-ammo combo kicks less and is easier to bring back on target than the Stoner. Try it and you'll see for yourself. No kidding.

Granted its far flatter exterior ballistics, M-74 bullets are more likely to make hits out to 400 meters than M-43; keep in mind, 'tis solely hits that matter in real reality.

The bigger question, then, is whether to go with an AR-15 platform or a Kalashnikov one in this caliber. That choice, Me, is up to you. You are already familiar with OTC or wholesale cost differentials between milsurp or commercial 5.45mm ammo and .223Rem/5.56mmNATO so no need to harp on that now.

Are there practicals diff between the .20 caliber cartridges? Yes, yes there are. I'll go with the fresher offering of the two, thank you very much. Lots of kids will jump up at that o p i n i o n yet it is mine and I'm sticking to it. So, yes, get another Kalashnikov style rifle in the 5.45mm chambering; you'll be glad you did ... and that's a fact.

[Me]

For me I've tended to perfer Russian guns for reliability if nothing else. I was issued with a shot out m-16/203 and our armorer was a dipshit. Being 18 I didn't know anything about anything. This is probaly where my original distaste for that paticular system comes from. Where as joe commie can make something that any idiot can use with almost no training ( put mag here pull this point that way and pull this. When empty repet step one ). So maybe good for me that I got out befor anybody started shooting at me (do miss the 203 though). And joe commie was pertty damn good at coming up with new and improved ways to screw people up. Also I have never seen anybody beat the barrle of an m4 with a hammer and expect it to still function. So just my simple opinion. Yeah new scope for the psl showed up. Now I just need the damn weather to be agreeable so I can shoot it for the first time. Starting to piss me off.

[gewamser]

I'm not saying that the AK 74 system isn't a good combat rifle, just that it is obsolete. A Winchester 30-30 or a Springfield '03 are deadly effective rifles, but are also obsolete. If a 74 with the inexpensive ammo suits you, thats fine. I was just thinking of looking forward, not back. I love my own '74 but my personal choice would be the M4 clone in a pinch. It's lighter, more accurate, has better ergonomics, modular in design, easy to rebuild, is almost as reliable, and has better sights. The rounds are very similar except that the eastern block ammo is of uneven quality.

[n16ht5]

Originally Posted by gewamser

I'm not saying that the AK 74 system isn't a good combat rifle, just that it is obsolete. A Winchester 30-30 or a Springfield '03 are deadly effective rifles, but are also obsolete. If a 74 with the inexpensive ammo suits you, thats fine. I was just thinking of looking forward, not back. I love my own '74 but my personal choice would be the M4 clone in a pinch. It's lighter, more accurate, has better ergonomics, modular in design, easy to rebuild, is almost as reliable, and has better sights. The rounds are very similar except that the eastern block ammo is of uneven quality.

You're crazy.. what rifle do the russians issue right now hmm?

[five40five]

Of course the Winchester Lever Actions and the Springfield Bolt Actions are obsolete compared to automatic actions of which there are several variaties.Piston driven bolt AK's are much more reliable,durable and a hell of a lot cleaner than the gas driven bolt AR's.That's why they offer a piston drive upgrade for the AR at a couple of hundred bucks,and IIRC the FN SCAR and the H&K 416 were both concidered as replacements for the M4 and both are piston driven short stroke gas operated.Seems to me that the AK's 60+ year obsolete,out-dated piston drive is finally catching up.And I don't need a lenghty training course and several hundred dollars in special tools to work on an AK.

[stevie73]

I spent 10 years in the Army, and as such have shot a LOT of rounds through the M-16. And as a result of that experience...I now prefer AK-74's. That should tell you something.

With a good 74, you will get about the same level of accuracy that you can get with an AR. The big difference is that mil-spec ammo for the 74 can be had for 13-15 cents/round, as opposed to 40-50 cents/round for mil-spec AR ammo. In other words, it is about 3x cheaper to shoot a 74. To many of us, that is not an unimportant consideration.

In addition, in terms of reliability, I will take an AK over an AR any day of the week. AK bolts don't break, need o-rings replaced, etc. And I can shoot my AK for a LONG time without cleaning it, whereas my AR will most certainly let me know if it is too dirty. In other words, the AK requires less maintenance to do its job.

As far as terminal performance goes, that's a never ending debate. Suffice it to say, the primary wounding mechanism of the AK-74 round (immediate and pronounced tissue disruption) seems to me to be more reliable than the primary wounding mechanism of the AR round (fragmentation). Fragmentation of the AR round is unreliable outside of 150 meters or so, whereas the 5.45 will still possess it's primary wounding mechanism out to 500 meters.

So in the final analysis, while both the AR-15 and the AK-74 will "do the job", the 74 will do it for much, much less money, arguably with better reliability, and arguably with a broader terminal performance profile. And because I can get 1,080 rounds of 5.45 for as little as $120, I can afford to buy a lot of it! Can't say that about 5.56mm ammo.

The only caveat I have about AK-74's is this: buying one may not be a great idea if you're the type of person who can only afford to buy one tin of ammo with it. When people ask me about 74's, I generally tell them that if they can't afford to buy at LEAST 5 or 6 tins of ammo at the same time, then they might want to reconsider buying a 74. Because if you own an AK-74, you are COMPLETELY at the whim of foreign supplies of 5.45 ammo. If for any reason the ammo stops being imported (and I can think of several valid reasons this could happen), and you didn't have the smarts to "buy it cheap and stack it deep", then you will all of a sudden own a very expensive club.

Since 5.45 has been easily available for the last 2-3 years, some people forget about this. They forget that not too long ago, finding ANY 5.45 ammo was a challenge. That could most certainly happen again. Personally, I'm not worried about it, since I have used the last couple of years to increase my stockpile of 5.45. But anyone who is just now getting into AK-74 rifles, needs to properly understand the ammo situation. It sucks having a nice rifle, but not being able to find ammo for it!

[maxhush]

+1 to what Stevie just said.

I believe the situation of "apparent" decline of AK-74 usage in former Eastern Bloc countries has more to do with the politics of NATO (cartridge) standardization than any dislike of the 5.45x39 cartridge or the rifles chambered for it. Indeed, you have rifles like the Polish Beryl, which are essentially an "improved" Tantal chambered for 5.56x45. They also probably discovered that scrapping the Tantals out for parts and selling them to us netted them enough money to build their new version and essentially make the conversion for very little in terms of real cost, given the economies of scale. And it probably worked a lot better as an "economic stimulus package" than our domestic version has. Now the question is, where did all the surplus 5.45x39 from Poland and East Germany go?

[axwhipmaker]

A lot of the East German ammo was used up in the Balkan war (sold before the reunification) or destroyed after the reunification. Had something to do with German laws - its been 20 years but I remember it being all over the news in 90/91 - mainly because of environmental concerns.

[Jaimenv]

Do not sell the AR, specially if it works properly. Get a AK 74 and have a blast shooting cheaper ammo.

My experience with the early M16A1 are very fond, mind you not in combat, but in competition (rattle battle). This is back them (circa 1978) when the rifle was look at as a implement of war not a rifle that a marksman would use for displaying accuracy other than a "Expert" BOLO badge. You see back them a M14 was viewed as a accurate rifle. Sure things have changed since. Yet as funny as it may be with the change in war theater the military scrambles to dusts off and reactivate the M14's still in stock.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...6A1_brimob.jpg

With this clunker you see here we where deadly 500 yards out in full combat gear right after coming in from a 1 mile run hart pounding again in full combat gear other than ammo. We shot as fast as we could pulling on that skinny pencil like barrel with the issue sling snaked around your non shooting arm.

The rifles worked great we hardly had problems at all, as a matter of fact we used the same rifle we qualified with. You see the rifle works, it just requires diligent cleaning after every time you shoot it or it will give you trouble, as it is known at the worst time.

The accuracy was there all along, hampered by a skinny barrel that flexed when it got hot. Still we where able to group rounds on torso size targets at 500 yards, I am sure some one notice that and the rest is history.

I still remember using the tip of a .223 bullet to adjust both elevation and windage on my rifle just prior to get in to shooting position it was a challenge and a blast.

[Fast Eddie]

You know opinions are like ass holes and everyone has one so yes i got one i have 3 of the AK-47s and i like them and they are hard hitters as far as the round 7.62x39 Good Luck to you