Kalashnikov USA is showing their 5.56 and 5.45 rifles at SHOT 2022.
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Gun Jesus talks briefly about some of the newstuff coming from KUSA:
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I like AKs. I have an AK in 762x39 that I don’t shoot often but Im glad I have it and I like it.
I keep wondering if I should get a second AK or do something different with furniture/optic on the one I have. And now in 2022, I wonder about the age old AR vs AK debate. And it seems like things have flip flopped.
Used to be AKs were 1/4 or less the price of an AR. Now ARs are 1/2 the price of AKs.
Used to be AKs were more reliable than ARs. Now it seems like ARs may be more reliable than some of the junkier US-made AKs. But maybe not a fair comparison and I still think from an engineering perspective, AKs should be more reliable than ARs if built right. But ARs are pretty dang reliable these days so I don’t know if I need more than that.
Still seems like getting a red dot on an AK is a mission. Mine rocks iron sights. I hardly shoot it so I havnt cared enough to get a red dot on it, and I kind of like it with just irons.
I mention all that to ask, in 2022, what’s the reason for buying an AK relative to another gun like an AR? If the reason is because they’re cool and you want it, then my friend, cheers to you because I also think they’re cool and I want them. I’m wondering if there’s any practical /functional reason for one today.
Partly asking out of curiosity and partly because maybe the answer will nudge me to buying a second AK.
Mission drives the gear and if I know what AKs actually do better, if anything, then it might help me change up my existing AK to pursue that optimal function for it that makes it a gun I grab for some specialized reason.
I don’t think there’s any “reason”.
If you’re looking for one, I think that the further away you get from the AR that you own the Morse “sense” it makes.
For example, I like the fact that the one I bought has a folding stock, making it a non-SBR that folds down more compact than my non-SBR ARs. I actually kind of which I’d doubled down on that and just gotten the pistol with folding brace. Yes, in 2022 you can cobble together ARs that do the same thing.
I also wouldn’t bother with calibers other than 7.62x39 personally. Getting a bigger slower fatter bullet was part of my “reason”. And again, possible in the AR in 2022.
I suppose I could have just bought a pistol AR in 300wtf, with a folding brace, but IMO that’s pushing the design parameters of the AR past what it was designed for.
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I’m at this crossroad now. Whether I should get a 11.5” AK or just get a 300 BLK upper for the AR. I won’t really be shooting subsonic. Plenty 7.62x39 ammo where I am from, I’ll have to reload for the 300.
@Sanch
Mounting an optic on an AK is pretty easy. If they have a side rail RS Regulate for the win. No rail? Ultimak is the way to go.
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Me too! Isn’t that enough reason for most of us on the forum?
“Mission Drives the Gear” - You are 100% correct! What is your “Mission?”
If you have a “real world” mission for a rifle West of the Danube River then your gear is most likely an AR and that decision has been made at levels way above your head. Maybe you are a contractor who is given an AK in country so you want to train with your own while stateside? I understand that’s a thing. Other than that - I don’t think “mission” is really all that important for the common man exercising his 2A rights.
As for me - ever since retiring from my security job at a major shopping mall, my mission has been to enjoy shooting firearms and become as good with them as I can reasonably be given the constraints of my life. I’ve been shooting the AK as my primary rifle the past few years because if was raised on the AR, wanting to mix things up a bit, and I wanted to better understand Gospodin Kalashnikov’s invention. At the time of my decision, cheap 762x39 was icing on the cake. It’s been fun, I’ve learned a little, I can run the gun OK (but still not as well as an AR), and have gained an appreciation for it. I’ll keep shooting it until I grow tired of it, or the economics of feeding it no longer make sense. If the goblins come jogging and I need a rifle - I doubt its going to make much a difference between me being armed with an AR or AK.
As mentioned, mounting a red dot is a fairly easy task. RS Regulate are the best but I could never found them available when I had the money so I’m just a “poor” living down by the river with my Midwest side rail that seems to work for me.
In the end, I’d just “smoke what you got” and enjoy it until you don’t. No need to buy another rifle when you already got one.
Unless you want to…….