Just thought you’d want to know.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25497013

Interesting how it became such an iconic weapon.

Well sonovagun!

When you absolutely, positively have to………

i wonder how many children will get one for xmas?

Interesting how it became such an iconic weapon

Apparently, it worked every time – without much maintainance – whether you were a highly trained soldier or a third world freedom fighter/terrorist.

We were given boxes upon boxes of ammo and a slack handful of AKs during op harvest in Bosnia. We had a system of one firing, one ready, two filling mags (taking it in turns). There were about 8 teams of us doing this. I wouldn’t like to imagine how many thousands of rounds we put through those weapons. Not one stoppage. This was in the days of the infamous L85 mk1. It opened our eyes seeing that almost every household in the country had a more powerful and reliable weapon than we had.

Bury it in sand, dig it up years later, give it a shake. Fire away… Can’t fault that really .

What made it so reliable?

Good **** riddance

The original Uzi was a similar statement weapon but the second generation, Jack, squandered the money on bubble bath

IGMC

Last word on the AK47

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk6Utpg5JcM[/video]

Quite an epitaph. Responsible for a lot of widows.

What made it so reliable?

Wrecker is probably best to answer this one than me… i had a quick fam on one of these a few years ago. They’re reliable because they’re so simple. There’s not really even a proper safety catch, you just wedge the change lever in behind the bolt carrier.

They are pretty heavy though, and not very accurate (in my hands, at least).

All credit to the creator; genius in my estimation!

I hated the L85A1 proper pile of turd.

We had a gold plated Ak in the V+A iso out in Basra …. rumour has it that it belong to Saddam or one of his sons.

The Ak was/is so reliable as it has fewer moving parts and slacker tolerances compared to newer weapons!

Reliable beacause the tolerances of the moving parts are so large.

As for the safely, it does actually work as a proper safety. top is safe on, first notch down is full auto (Soviet Doctrine was to advance as a line clasting away on full auto) then semi auto.

They’re reliable because they’re so simple.

That was my thinking, although I’m not an armourer. We had a Ukranian on the Commando course. “Ukrane rifle; 4 dettols. British rifle; many, many dettols”. I think he was talking about parts.
God alone knows what anyone subject to a british ambush in the mid 90s would have thought… “why do they keep shouting stoppage?” 😀

Rubbish for getting a good grouping with though !

“Don’t try this at home. I am a professional Russian”

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOoUVeyaY_8[/video]

I had someone point one at the back of my head once and make that make that arming noise. It’s a classic classic sound

Got me prestige 10 on the original modern warfare, mine was gold plated too 😉

so simple even a child could use one

wonder how many people his invention has killed?

wonder how many people his invention has killed?

None – the rappers holding them did all the killing

Basically it was and is a good solid design, slack manufacturing tolerances and didn’t require much in the way of maintenance. Not very accurate at all but it didn’t need to be. It was also incredibly easy to mass produce and was in many many countries too.

They are pretty heavy though, and not very accurate (in my hands, at least).

Let’s face it, they’re not designed for sniping; in a fire-fight, accuracy is the first thing to go out the window, along with the AK’s barrel, waved vigorously around with the trigger held down.
If you want accuracy, and reliability, it’s difficult to top a Lee-Enfield.

The Lee-Enfield bolt-action, magazine-fed, repeating rifle was the main firearm used by the military forces of the British Empire and Commonwealth during the first half of the 20th century. It was the British Army’s standard rifle from its official adoption in 1895 until 1957.[3][4]
A redesign of the Lee-Metford which had been adopted by the British Army in 1888, the Lee-Enfield superseded the earlier Martini-Henry, Martini-Enfield, and Lee-Metford rifles. It featured a ten-round box magazine which was loaded with the .303 British cartridge manually from the top, either one round at a time or by means of five-round chargers. The Lee-Enfield was the standard issue weapon to rifle companies of the British Army and other Commonwealth nations in both the First and Second World Wars (these Commonwealth nations included Canada, Australia and South Africa, among others).[5] Although officially replaced in the UK with the L1A1 SLR in 1957, it remained in widespread British service until the early/mid-1960s and the 7.62 mm L42 sniper variant remained in service until the 1990s. As a standard-issue infantry rifle, it is still found in service in the armed forces of some Commonwealth nations,[6] notably with the Indian Police and Bangladesh Police, which makes it the longest-serving military bolt-action rifle still in official service.[7] The Canadian Forces’ Rangers Arctic reserve unit still use Enfield 4 rifles as of 2012, with plans announced to replace the weapons sometime in 2014 or 2015.[8] Total production of all Lee-Enfields is estimated at over 17 million rifles.[1]
The Lee-Enfield takes its name from the designer of the rifle’s bolt system—James Paris Lee—and the factory in which it was designed—the Royal Small Arms Factory in Enfield. In Australia, New Zealand, Southern Africa and Canada the rifle became known simply as the “303”.[citation needed]

Not getting this gun worship 😕

Quite a legacy, his ‘gift’ to the human race. Has the potential for a satirical conversation with St Peter though 😯

RIP, thoughts to his friends and family, so sad etc etc.

Well that’s the usual approach on here so why not for this guy?

“Not getting this gun worship
Quite a legacy, his ‘gift’ to the human race. Has the potential for a satirical conversation with St Peter though “

I’m with you to a degree but otoh he did fall into weapons engineering at the height of WW2 and when the important parts of the Soviet Union were mostly under fascist occupation.

I worked with AK74, accuracy wasn’t as precise as M16 but piercing of bullet is no joke. Reliability is unmatched too. Those AK47 are lighter and smaller (mostly used by police for versatile size etc) I don’t know why world takes it as 47 when military one in fact is 74.

I think the guy himself said that he’d much rather have invented a lawn mower or something like that when he saw how many had fallen into non-military hands and how many people had been killed as a result.

If he hadn’t designed it, someone else would have.

In terms of pure design and function over form it really is an engineering icon. A gun that can be repaired with some baler wire etc.

Shame we often put more effort into creating weapons with which to kill each other than into more constructive things, but plus ca change.

All AK series are called AK47’s in the same way vacuum cleaners are called Hoovers.

There’s so many different variants it’s silly.

kimbers – Member

so simple even a child could use one

wonder how many people his invention has killed?

Guns don’t kill but people do.

RIP Kalashnikov AK47, the equaliser.

@kimbers the look in that child’s eyes is lifeless

I think the guy himself said that he’d much rather have invented a lawn mower or something like that when he saw how many had fallen into non-military hands and how many people had been killed as a result.

He designed and promoted the arms industry up to his peaceful death in old age.

Shame the calibre was 7.62mm, though. If it had been 650b it would have made the target come alive. Or dead.