Is Romanian made AK bad?

Question

I read many articles online and found them saying the Romanian AK-47s are poorly made, is it true? In what way are they poorly made? What is the difference between Romanian made AK and other AK?

Answer 1

Many of their guns come out of the factory unfinished, meaning there is metal that has not been smoothed down and polished and there are also some operational issues. Some work fine, some have problems. That's a fact that any online discussion forum dealing in AK variants will verify.

The Norinco and the MAK90 AKs from China are very high quality, nearly as good as the Russian made ones. They are made from heavy duty receivers, all parts are well finished and the barrels are chrome lined and heavy.

I am no fan of the Chinese products in general, but for the AKs on the market they are near the top.

Answer 2

To clear the air on the "Chinese AK" debate, there have been several manufacturers over the years. Some have made the worst AK's known and others have made AK's that compete with the best. It is as simple as that.

Romanians are on the low end but I own one built from a parts kit and I am pleased with it. Keep in mind that no AK is a premium, precision weapon. For me, the Romanian fits my needs: It hits within a few inches of my point of aim at 100 yds and it shoots cheap ammo.

Answer 3

I bought a dozen of the Romanian AK models; most of them for christmas presents for daughters and friends. I checked out the various offerings and tested them. Found the Romanian models to be well made, accurate right out of the box (test targets included with rifles to show how they were test fired), and they all had panache. There is no such thing as a bad AK; and I could find nothing at all wrong with the Romanian models; in fact I love them one and all.

Answer 4

People just like to bad mouth the AK. It is mostly people who shoot bad, instead of blaming themselves for being a bad shot they just say it is the guns fault. The AK really isn't that inaccurate with decent ammo and a good shooter. It isn't a target rifle but it can compete on the battlefield or on the hunt. It is hard to make an AK bad, they were designed to be made using the very basic machinery and minimally skilled labor.... it could be very old and heavily used or it could have been improperly stored but you would have to be mentally defective to build an AK very bad.

All I have heard about Romanian AK's is good, everyone I have heard talk about them seems satisfied.

Like Harry says, Chinese stuff is almost always junkier than anything else on the market, but when dealing with AK's it still comes back to the simple designs, there just isn't very much to do wrong.

Answer 5

Listen to DJ. He's top in the Hunting category because he knows what he's talking about.

In addition to the fact that Romanian AK's are crudely machined and finished,
(which is not all that unusual for military arms, and in and of itself does not affect function.)
- the stampings, particularly the reciever cover, are not very consistant. I've seen covers on them that were loose, and no amount of tinkering seemed to help tighten them.. Often they had sharp bottom edges as well.
To make matters worse, these rifles are produced from parts kits, which,
(particularly in the case of the Romanian guns for some reason)
are often terribly worn.
The barrels, even the chrome lined ones, are often dark-bored, rusted and pitted.
The metal in these kits before re-finishing is often almost devoid of finish from being drug through the mud by generations of Romanian soldiers, Who didn't always care for their weapons as well as they could have, to say the least. In some cases the rifles were intentionally abused by resentful draftees, I'm sure,
but the bottom line is, the "original" parts on these guns were worn out to begin with.
Thats why Romania SOLD them.
US Companies buy these kits,
(which had had the reciever removed), And "rebuild" them into "new" rifles using a specified number of US made small parts to comform with the section 922R "imported assault rifle" law.
The remainder of the parts are still worn-out surplus.
The rifles are then refinished to disguise the fact that they were used to near-death, before being pawned-off as a "new" gun.
The AK is a solid design, and most of these rifles still are capible of reliable function.
But are they as accurate as they could be?
No.
Are they going to last as long as an example made with all-new parts?
No.
Will they fill a gap in a collection?
Sure.
Are they fun to plink with?
Sure.
Are they the best AK's?
Not even close.
Do some of them not work well?
A LOT of them don't.
TOO MANY of them don't.
It's risky to buy one of these for the simple fact that you can't be sure if you are getting a good rifle or a crappy rifle untill you buy it.
It may LOOK new, but only if you could have seen it before it was refinished, would you know how used it really IS.

There is a reason these rifles are so cheap.
They BEGAN life new, as a cheaply made AK.
The folks who made them got their money's worth out of them before discarding them to the US as kits.
The US recievers they are assembled on are the cheapest of the lot as well, and many are sub-1mm thickness.
If the rebuilders could get away with charging close to 1000.00 for these, like they can for a Polish Tantal AK, believe me they WOULD.
- They'd have to be stupid NOT to if they could!
But they can't.
You can only polish up a turd so much.

(If Chinese Norinco's are so lousy and cheap, why then do you suppose they hold their value better than, and, sell for more money than, these Romanian rifles? Norinco and Poly Tech made many more good rifles than they did bad, AND the rifles they sold here were all completely NEWLY MADE weapons.)

Answer 6

I agree with Colter. The only way you can really screw up an AK is if it's chinese made.Even then its not that bad.A lot of people do blame the gun for them not being able to hit stuff.

Answer 7

ill just put it this way, it's harder 2 screw up and AK design than it is 2 make a new 1.

Answer 8

I agree with the previous answerers, the only crappy AK you will find is probably Chinese made.

Answer 9

There's nothing at all wrong with them.