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Sarge · May 10, 2005, 08:23 PM

Since May 9, 2005 was the official celebration of President Harry S. Truman’s birthday here in Missouri, it seemed like the perfect time bust a few caps. The rifle I chose for this outing was my SAR-1; one of the first Romanian import versions of the AK-47.

“But Harry was a Democrat” you might say, “and Democrats hate guns. And they REALLY hate AK-47s!”

You’d be wrong- about Harry, at least. HST was a Democrat all right, and a damn good one. Too bad he isn't running the party today! Harry loved guns- and not like a certain pretender who ran for the office of president recently. How do I know this? I had the good fortune to work security for the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library several years ago, and the equal good fortune to have examined many of his firearms. President Harry S. Truman was a consummate gun collector by anyone’s standards.

Harry had light and heavy US and foreign machine guns, so I doubt that my little semi-auto AK clone would have offended him much. He also accumulated enough handguns to cover your kitchen table. Many of these handguns bore beautiful and near-identical walnut grips, with the initials “HST” inlaid in pearl. A man don’t go to that much trouble if he simply regards gun ownership as “disposable political goods.” Harry Truman was the real deal. He also knew how to end, and win, a war. We could use a little of his “tactical common sense” in high places, today.

But back to the SAR-1-

Several weeks ago, I took this rifle out for a 225-250 yard plinking session. The results were not impressive, for a couple of reasons that had nothing to do with the gun. It was cold & blowing hard, and the wind was right in our faces; our eyes were watering like leaky faucets. I was also shooting Wolf hardball, and this gun had been zeroed with Barnaul “Silver Bear” FMJ. We were getting close to the distant milk jugs we were shooting at, but we just weren’t connecting with them. So I had an excellent excuse to retire to the range for some zero-verification, today. Conditions were good and the range was empty, so I stapled up a couple of 8” bulls, at 100 yards.

Since I had a pretty good idea that the gun was at least close with the Barnaul Silver Bear ball, I started with 5 rounds of that. Silver Bear has produced a couple of 3-shot, 200 groups in the neighborhood of 4-5 inches from this gun; so it is the ball round for this rifle, as far as I’m concerned. The zero was still good and those rounds are highlighted in red, on the target below. I also wanted to see if I could find a soft-point load that shot to the same POI as my FMJ load. I had marked the first five, so I let another five of Barnaul soft-point go in the next string; these rounds are highlighted in yellow. These seemed to shoot a little high, and while they are fine for varmints out to 50 yards, the zero wasn’t as close as I had hoped for. I marked the target and returned to the bench.

I still had few rounds of Norinco soft-point in the bag, so I loaded five, and fired another string. These shot to nearly the same POI as the ball round, and they are highlighted in blue below.

While I didn’t set out to shoot groups today, very few of the 15 rounds fired would have missed an enemy soldier’s head, at one-hundred yards. I was simply resting the gun over my range bag on the bench, and didn’t even bother “getting into the sling” today. When you consider that I was shooting three distinctly different loads, through a stamped-receiver AK, with a home-made rear peep aperture- this ain’t too shabby. When you add the fact that I have 48 year-old eyes and I lost my glasses last deer season- it’s downright amazing!

The AK is no bench-rest rifle, but I like these guns anyway. I have had a dufflebag-full of old Mausers over the years, that didn’t shoot as well as this little rifle does.

Since there was still a good bit of HST day left at the end of this exercise, I decided to try one round each of the ammunition mentioned, against my favorite expendable ballistic medium; water-filled 100 oz. laundry-detergent jugs. Two of these placed back-to-back will stop most expanding pistol rounds, and many centerfire rifle rounds. I haven’t quite figured out why- but they are real hard on bullets. I back them up with an old Kansas City phone book, braced against a section of 2x8 lumber. Shooting was done at 10 yards. The photo gives an idea of the results, but the only round that penetrated both jugs was the Barnaul ball. It burst the first jug and exited sideways, passing through #2 with enough retained velocity to split it at the seams, and still penetrate about 2 ½” into the phone book. It tore a pretty good hole in that, as well.

Both of the soft-point rounds exhibited similar characteristics; each burst the first jug and tossed it several feet in the air; the main core fragment and separated jacket of each was recovered inside the second jug. Speaking of bullet fragments, it was apparent that may were shed and lost as the first jug was exploded by the soft-point bullets’ impact. The 125 grain Barnaul did a bit more damage to the first jug, than the Norinco soft-point did. The jugs appear in the photo below for your review and in each case the jug that received the bullet’s initial impact, is lying to the right.

And finally, there are the bullets themselves. The Norinco soft-point core weighed but 44 grains, and its separated jacket weighed 42.5 grains. The Barnaul soft-point’s core fragment weighed 59.1 grains, and its jacket weighed 23.4 grains. The Silver Bear ball round retained 120.8 grains through the ordeal, flattening itself notably as it plowed through the jugs and catalog sideways. You can have a look at them and draw your own conclusions.

And finally, as promised, I subjected the Wolf 154 grain soft-point to the same test. The result looks much more like what we expect from a big-game bullet. The recovered slug expanded perfectly, and weighs 146.5 grains. If you look at the jugs that were hit by the FMJ round, you will have a picture of what the Wolf did; except that the Wolf load launched both caps about 12 feet straight up in the air. It also fully penetrated both jugs, and bored straight into the phone book about 3 inches. It was apparent that this bullet bored true, and did not yaw regardless of what it encountered.

The Barnaul “Silver Bear” ball ammo is still going to be my “go to” load for this gun. It is accurate, shoots to point-of-aim, and has plenty of “oomph” for anti-personnel us. I would much prefer it to any 7.62x39 soft-point load, especially if a vehicle were part of the tactical problem at hand. I also strongly suspect that this round would perform better than you might think, if it were pressed into service as a deer/coyote round.

Still, a soft-point is what you select if you expect to turn the gun on a game animal I am amending my original opinion on this one. After testing the Wolf soft-point, I would use it with confidence on deer-sized game. I have shot enough of it that I don’t believe POI will be a problem out to 150 yards. I will check the 100-yard zero and grouping for this load and post a target pic to this thread, for anyone interested. I like the fact that it starts out at the same roughly the same weight as your typical .30-30 round- a proven deer-killer by anyone’s standards.

For lighter game like coyotes, I like the Norinco soft-point. Like the ball ammo, it is accurate, shoots where it looks, and expands like a varmint load should.

These loads certainly add a degree of versatility to 7.62x39 rifles, that we didn't dream of 20 years ago.

The AK itself is a great little gun. This one has been stone reliable, never jamming once in several thousand rounds of various and sundry 7.62x39 ammo- including many soft-points and hollow-points. Less than a yardstick long, it is a lot of gun in a small package. It is also damned near indestructible and accurate enough for its intended mission; it would make a passable hunting rifle as well. I just may kill a deer with it this year, to spite idiot politicians who seem to think that a pistol-grip and a box magazine make a simple machine capable of diabolical acts.

Judging from what I know of Harry Truman- I think he just might agree.

May 10, 2005, 08:23 PM	#1
Sarge Senior Member Join Date: May 12, 2002 Location: MO Posts: 5,457	"Harry Day" with the AK-corrected/Wolf 154 added Since May 9, 2005 was the official celebration of President Harry S. Truman’s birthday here in Missouri, it seemed like the perfect time bust a few caps. The rifle I chose for this outing was my SAR-1; one of the first Romanian import versions of the AK-47. “But Harry was a Democrat” you might say, “and Democrats hate guns. And they REALLY hate AK-47s!” You’d be wrong- about Harry, at least. HST was a Democrat all right, and a damn good one. Too bad he isn't running the party today! Harry loved guns- and not like a certain pretender who ran for the office of president recently. How do I know this? I had the good fortune to work security for the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library several years ago, and the equal good fortune to have examined many of his firearms. President Harry S. Truman was a consummate gun collector by anyone’s standards. Harry had light and heavy US and foreign machine guns, so I doubt that my little semi-auto AK clone would have offended him much. He also accumulated enough handguns to cover your kitchen table. Many of these handguns bore beautiful and near-identical walnut grips, with the initials “HST” inlaid in pearl. A man don’t go to that much trouble if he simply regards gun ownership as “disposable political goods.” Harry Truman was the real deal. He also knew how to end, and win, a war. We could use a little of his “tactical common sense” in high places, today. But back to the SAR-1- Several weeks ago, I took this rifle out for a 225-250 yard plinking session. The results were not impressive, for a couple of reasons that had nothing to do with the gun. It was cold & blowing hard, and the wind was right in our faces; our eyes were watering like leaky faucets. I was also shooting Wolf hardball, and this gun had been zeroed with Barnaul “Silver Bear” FMJ. We were getting close to the distant milk jugs we were shooting at, but we just weren’t connecting with them. So I had an excellent excuse to retire to the range for some zero-verification, today. Conditions were good and the range was empty, so I stapled up a couple of 8” bulls, at 100 yards. Since I had a pretty good idea that the gun was at least close with the Barnaul Silver Bear ball, I started with 5 rounds of that. Silver Bear has produced a couple of 3-shot, 200 groups in the neighborhood of 4-5 inches from this gun; so it is the ball round for this rifle, as far as I’m concerned. The zero was still good and those rounds are highlighted in red, on the target below. I also wanted to see if I could find a soft-point load that shot to the same POI as my FMJ load. I had marked the first five, so I let another five of Barnaul soft-point go in the next string; these rounds are highlighted in yellow. These seemed to shoot a little high, and while they are fine for varmints out to 50 yards, the zero wasn’t as close as I had hoped for. I marked the target and returned to the bench. I still had few rounds of Norinco soft-point in the bag, so I loaded five, and fired another string. These shot to nearly the same POI as the ball round, and they are highlighted in blue below. While I didn’t set out to shoot groups today, very few of the 15 rounds fired would have missed an enemy soldier’s head, at one-hundred yards. I was simply resting the gun over my range bag on the bench, and didn’t even bother “getting into the sling” today. When you consider that I was shooting three distinctly different loads, through a stamped-receiver AK, with a home-made rear peep aperture- this ain’t too shabby. When you add the fact that I have 48 year-old eyes and I lost my glasses last deer season- it’s downright amazing! The AK is no bench-rest rifle, but I like these guns anyway. I have had a dufflebag-full of old Mausers over the years, that didn’t shoot as well as this little rifle does. Since there was still a good bit of HST day left at the end of this exercise, I decided to try one round each of the ammunition mentioned, against my favorite expendable ballistic medium; water-filled 100 oz. laundry-detergent jugs. Two of these placed back-to-back will stop most expanding pistol rounds, and many centerfire rifle rounds. I haven’t quite figured out why- but they are real hard on bullets. I back them up with an old Kansas City phone book, braced against a section of 2x8 lumber. Shooting was done at 10 yards. The photo gives an idea of the results, but the only round that penetrated both jugs was the Barnaul ball. It burst the first jug and exited sideways, passing through #2 with enough retained velocity to split it at the seams, and still penetrate about 2 ½” into the phone book. It tore a pretty good hole in that, as well. Both of the soft-point rounds exhibited similar characteristics; each burst the first jug and tossed it several feet in the air; the main core fragment and separated jacket of each was recovered inside the second jug. Speaking of bullet fragments, it was apparent that may were shed and lost as the first jug was exploded by the soft-point bullets’ impact. The 125 grain Barnaul did a bit more damage to the first jug, than the Norinco soft-point did. The jugs appear in the photo below for your review and in each case the jug that received the bullet’s initial impact, is lying to the right. And finally, there are the bullets themselves. The Norinco soft-point core weighed but 44 grains, and its separated jacket weighed 42.5 grains. The Barnaul soft-point’s core fragment weighed 59.1 grains, and its jacket weighed 23.4 grains. The Silver Bear ball round retained 120.8 grains through the ordeal, flattening itself notably as it plowed through the jugs and catalog sideways. You can have a look at them and draw your own conclusions. And finally, as promised, I subjected the Wolf 154 grain soft-point to the same test. The result looks much more like what we expect from a big-game bullet. The recovered slug expanded perfectly, and weighs 146.5 grains. If you look at the jugs that were hit by the FMJ round, you will have a picture of what the Wolf did; except that the Wolf load launched both caps about 12 feet straight up in the air. It also fully penetrated both jugs, and bored straight into the phone book about 3 inches. It was apparent that this bullet bored true, and did not yaw regardless of what it encountered. The Barnaul “Silver Bear” ball ammo is still going to be my “go to” load for this gun. It is accurate, shoots to point-of-aim, and has plenty of “oomph” for anti-personnel us. I would much prefer it to any 7.62x39 soft-point load, especially if a vehicle were part of the tactical problem at hand. I also strongly suspect that this round would perform better than you might think, if it were pressed into service as a deer/coyote round. Still, a soft-point is what you select if you expect to turn the gun on a game animal I am amending my original opinion on this one. After testing the Wolf soft-point, I would use it with confidence on deer-sized game. I have shot enough of it that I don’t believe POI will be a problem out to 150 yards. I will check the 100-yard zero and grouping for this load and post a target pic to this thread, for anyone interested. I like the fact that it starts out at the same roughly the same weight as your typical .30-30 round- a proven deer-killer by anyone’s standards. For lighter game like coyotes, I like the Norinco soft-point. Like the ball ammo, it is accurate, shoots where it looks, and expands like a varmint load should. These loads certainly add a degree of versatility to 7.62x39 rifles, that we didn't dream of 20 years ago. The AK itself is a great little gun. This one has been stone reliable, never jamming once in several thousand rounds of various and sundry 7.62x39 ammo- including many soft-points and hollow-points. Less than a yardstick long, it is a lot of gun in a small package. It is also damned near indestructible and accurate enough for its intended mission; it would make a passable hunting rifle as well. I just may kill a deer with it this year, to spite idiot politicians who seem to think that a pistol-grip and a box magazine make a simple machine capable of diabolical acts. Judging from what I know of Harry Truman- I think he just might agree. __________________ People were smarter before the Internet, or imbeciles were harder to notice. Last edited by Sarge; May 12, 2005 at 09:19 PM.