Vepr 6.5 Accuracy

[ahillock]

The 5.45 X 36 was (I believe) an issued ball round. Something caused the holes in the paper behind the tree but even the guy shooting the round wasn't sure if they were spall or parts of the bullet. If the bullet, it did what a open cavity type of service bullet does. It entered the tree, the jacket disintegrated and the bullet started tumbling while disintegrating. That is what this particular bullet design is made to do at close range where its velocity is still high.

The 5.45x39 in that test was regular solid lead core commercial ammo, aka Golden Tiger 59 gr 5.45x39. It wasn't even the good surplus stuff, 7n6. That 7n6 has a mild steel core penetrator, and the newer date 7n6m has a hardened steel rod. We can't even get the really good stuff like 7n10, 7n22 and 7n24 which are better than any M193, M855 or 77gr TMK.

For a FMJ, that 7n6 is great in soft tissue because it yaws and tumbles very easily and has a devastating permanent wound cavity + has the mild steel core. Plus it isn't as velocity dependent as some of the service 5.56s are to fragment.

Again, I just showed that video clip to show that the 5.45 with a hollow air cavity (commercial ammo at that) isn't such a terrible penetrator against hard targets. It does quite well and surprises many that don't have experience shooting it.

The u tube was not a good test. The only thing it did was compare a true service round (5.45) against three other non service rounds.

Again, that 5.45x39 tested in that video was not a service round (7n6 or others) but was commercial ammo. It was the Golden Tiger 59 gr 5.45x39. That is commercial ammo. While ok for what it is, it doesn't compare to 7n6 or the other military 5.45 rounds like 7n10, 7n22 or 7n24.

I imagine the Serbs are going through this right now with their Grendel ammo for their AK's. I am interested to see what their testing was and the results. Honestly, unless they are using a unique type of core design or jacket, I am not sure the effects will be any different than any other round of service ball.

It will be interesting to see which round Serbia goes with for their military. I doubt they are going to just adapt some off the shelf commercial ammo for their military. They will probably do some sort of steel core round if I had to wager a guess. Similar to the 5.45 military rounds.

[LR1955]

The 5.45x39 in that test was regular solid lead core commercial ammo, aka Golden Tiger 59 gr 5.45x39. It wasn't even the good surplus stuff, 7n6. That 7n6 has a mild steel core penetrator, and the newer date 7n6m has a hardened steel rod. We can't even get the really good stuff like 7n10, 7n22 and 7n24 which are better than any M193, M855 or 77gr TMK.

For a FMJ, that 7n6 is great in soft tissue because it yaws and tumbles very easily and has a devastating permanent wound cavity + has the mild steel core. Plus it isn't as velocity dependent as some of the service 5.56s are to fragment.

Again, I just showed that video clip to show that the 5.45 with a hollow air cavity (commercial ammo at that) isn't such a terrible penetrator against hard targets. It does quite well and surprises many that don't have experience shooting it.




Again, that 5.45x39 tested in that video was not a service round (7n6 or others) but was commercial ammo. It was the Golden Tiger 59 gr 5.45x39. That is commercial ammo. While ok for what it is, it doesn't compare to 7n6 or the other military 5.45 rounds like 7n10, 7n22 or 7n24.




It will be interesting to see which round Serbia goes with for their military. I doubt they are going to just adapt some off the shelf commercial ammo for their military. They will probably do some sort of steel core round if I had to wager a guess. Similar to the 5.45 military rounds.

AH:

Thanks for the poop on the 5.45 that was fired. I wasn't sure and didn't have time to find out.

I don't think the video was smoke and mirrors. In those conditions, that's what happened. My bet is that issued M-80 and M-855 would probably go through. Maybe the issued Soviet 5.45 wouldn't? Just have to shoot them and find out.

I recall when the Soviets came out with the 5.45. I believe it was during their Afghanistan adventures. The reports were not formal but from what I remember, the round was devastating at close ranges but didn't do well at long ranges. Sounds familiar.

Got to watch the amount of cavity in the front of a bullet though. Too much and you won't stabilize it well. I have some .303 British that has wood filler for most of the ogive and tip. No need to bother with sights for that stuff. Maybe it does give great terminal effects but you got to shoot the enemy, not just shoot at him.

Also watch the obliquity angles. In terms of penetration, angle of obliquity has a massive amount of importance. The guy in the video shot the other ammo at much greater angles which could have meant the difference between penetration and none. Maybe not, but that's why tests need to be very carefully planned and executed.

Enough for me on this one.

When MA figures out why his AK blaster isn't blasting well, I am all eyes.

LR55

[ahillock]

When MA figures out why his AK blaster isn't blasting well, I am all eyes.

Could be as simple as the VEPR magwell shaving off the tips of longer bullets like MA mentioned Bill Alexander alluded to. If the Molot engineers designed the VEPR primarily for steel case ammo....

[LRRPF52]

d
Here's one: http://www.gunsandammo.com/uncategor...s-and-marines/

Among other issues, looks like the "green" M855A1 shoots at much higher pressure than other available service rounds, which would be "problematic" to say the least in the M-4.

At any rate, I'm not in the habit of taking any "information" decimated by any branch of the federal gov't without a lot of salt -- or not buying it at all. These are the same ****suckers telling us that the Russians "hacked" the election, that Hitlery "did nothing wrong," etc. -- as well as promulgating tons of disinformation and BS about the M16 / M4 platform over the last 6 decades (procurement corruption, cooking service rifle / ammo competitions, etc.) that have gotten a lot of good American soldiers killed over the years. So, I wouldn't take anything from the .gov / procurement gravy train as gospel by any stretch of the imagination.

Unfortunately, M855A1 is virtually nonexistent for objective testing outside the .gov, aside from a couple of short range ballistics gel tests that don't tell you much about how it performs at rifle distances. Looks like it's going to cost "match grade" prices, though, considering the complexities of its construction.

As far as the ISPC, 3 gun competitions, target shoots, etc., these are just games sponsored by corporations promoting their products, mainly AR-15s, 1911s and Glocks. For one thing, nobody is shooting at them. On the two-way rifle range (with much higher stakes) the AK is by far the weapon of choice the world over.

For my purposes, the AK (or a Vz58) is a better choice than an AR because it requires relatively little maintenance, goes bang when you pull the trigger, and is certainly accurate enough (1-2" MOA with my Arsenals and Veprs), which is what you need when the SHTF and you don't have a 10,000 mile supply chain servicing you. 7.62x39 hits harder, penetrates barriers and is more lethal and more cost effective than 5.56, especially now with 8M3 bullets coming back on the market. 6.5 Grendel promises to be even better than 7.62x39: more accurate, flatter shooting, extended range, and still as barrier blind and lethal -- and cost effective.

I've shot a lot of different AKs over the past few decades, to include 11,500rd spendex sessions, high volume training courses where there were specific CQM objectives for attendees, deployments into swampy regions, icy peninsulas in the winter, Arctic, and deserts with high sand, high heat, high dust.

Variants I have experience with in order of most round count:

Romanian AKM Pistol Mitralieră 63/65
East German MPKiMS-74 5.45x39
SAKO Rk92/Rk95 (these don't exist in the US)
Valmet Rk62
Bulgarian Arsenal stamped and billet models, Euro models, never imported to US
Yugoslavian M70
Galil ARM (real ones, not US imports)
Galil SAR (same)
AKSU (real)

Polish Beryl
South African R4 (real)
Saiga for European market, not US
North Korean Type 68

Some US imported ones like WASR, Chinese Norincos, Polytechs.

Czech Vz58 carbine

The only guns I remember not having problems with in terms of reliability, breakage, or magazine compatibility were the Finnish guns, East German MPKiMS-74s, Galils, and South African guns.

The Warsaw Pact guns are generally garbage by Western standards, for the simple reason that they were made in a very primitive manufacturing industry. This is hard for people online who only have limited frames of reference as to how people lived and still live over there, which is like stepping backwards in time into the early 1900s really.

After being brutalized by 2 world wars, there wasn't a lot of industry left over that survived, and that which did had been subjected to purges of the intelligent people in Russia in the Bolshevik Revolution, to the extent that many professionals saw the writing on the wall, and fled while they could.

The idea is that the glorious Sovyetksi movement magically invigorated creativity and productivity, producing the world's best assault rifle. In reality, they made a heavy sub machinegun that fires an intermediate cartridge subjected to the dominant bore diameter of their barrel-making machinery of the era, namely .311" for Mosin-Nagant rifles of late 1800s era design during the Czarist Empire.

After realizing the effectiveness of motorized infantry in maneuver warfare, you only really need your dismounted infantry to carry some type of automatic fire capable weapon with more magazine capacity to carry on the last order of battle once artillery and armor had bombarded the objective area, and dismounts exit BTRs or later BMPs to clean up the few stragglers, often in urbanized locations.

The Avtomat Kalashnikov rifle, type 7.62mm made sense for them in this regard, with the absolute minimum amount of materials used for its construction, and very low working pressures reminiscent of the limitations of maximum yield of steels before World War II being used for its construction. They pulled this off very well.

With all that said, while I fin AKs of that industrial base to be poor in reliability, I'll admit that I personally have seen practical accuracy from them that is a bit better than most will concede, not talking about the well-built Finnish, German, and Israeli copies of Finnish guns here, but the garbage by Western standards Eastern Europe, Eurasian, and Asian rifles.

The ammunition variance in accuracy is another variable that increases the cone of error/dispersion pattern. Of the Warsaw Pact nations, the East German DDR stuff is probably the best.

Finnish Defense Forces SAKO brass-cased 7.62x39 is one of the most accurate assault rifle loads ever produced, closer to Mk.262, but the Finns are a bit different culturally when it comes to making rifles and ammo. They don't like the idea of cranking out garbage.

Even with the kick-start stuck case, failure to extract Romanian garbage, I can hit IPSC in minimal wind conditions out to 400-500yds, and have done so. It's easier with an AR, especially since they work, but the accuracy I've seen with garbage AKs is more than adequate for military use, especially in the nations it was intended for.

[LRRPF52]

AKSU is one of the worst as well, mirrored by comments I heard from Russian MVD and GRU Spetsnaz. Their biggest complaint with those guns is that they just don't last long at all when you train with them, so they preferred the full-length AKS-74, often with the RPK-74 45rd mags.

AKSUs lose their rifling fast, gas port erodes rapidly, cyclic kicks up, very low lifespan for critical parts when you shoot them. Ask any machinegun rental range that has them and they'll say the same, while their full-length guns supported with quality US parts will last very long.

I went into all this much younger with a romantic expectation for AK reliability, and the more I shot, the more that disappeared. I've learned to be dispassionate about these things as best as I can, even with that childhood desire to own a real Russian AKM with the reddish laminate wood furniture contrasted on black enamel steel.

[MeatAxe]

Wow...and to think this thread started out as a inquiry on 6.5 Grendel accuracy in a Vepr (sorry, only have @ 50 rounds through mine so far, so the jury is still out). But for some reason the AR aficionados want to swoop in and nip heresy in the bud. So enamored by the AR, I don't know why the should care about the Vepr other than to enforce AR Group Think.

Sorry, I just don't buy it, even with my limited experience over the past 30 years. I've had supposedly quality ARs (Colts and Armalites) that short stroked and ate their gas rings while a cheap $189 Chinese AK kept on shooting with little or no maintenance and pretty damned accurately, with better triggers than the litigation-fearing AR manufacturers. I'm going to have to dig up the article where the powers that be decided that the reliability threshold for their designated gravy train rifle (the "improved" M4A1) was only 450 rounds between stoppages. Is that acceptable for a combat rifle? I guess the idea is to band-aid the M4 and 5.56 into perfection, using our armed forces as beta testers on the battlefield, going on 60+ years now.

For your perusal:

Actually, the reliability issue with the M4 is worse in dusty environments - one stoppage every 68 rounds:

http://www.murdoconline.net/archives/5325.html

Cooking the competition in favor of the "improved" M4A1:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/19/armys-quits-tests-after-competing-rifle-outperform/

US Marines barrier penetration tests (with a 20" bbl M16), AK for the win (or I guess we better hope our enemies don't take cover behind anything harder than plywood):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lprGoEpDXJQ

How the hell can a cheap commie AK go through 300,000 rounds without blowing up - guess it depends on the AK:

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2015/06/03/how-many-rounds-can-an-ak-fire-before-it-breaks-down/

And it still fires...(could an AR survive this?) now if that's not a testament to the design and build quality of the AK, I don't know what is. Of course, most of the US manufactures attempts to build their own AKs have ended in abject failure, so the old com bloc must be doing something right.

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2016/04/12/214905/

Of course, as I stated numerous times, a good AK works for me as a SHTF rifle because they work, they hit hard and they're accurate enough to wreak havoc on my enemies. Perhaps if I had billions of dollars worth of high tech weaponry at my disposal, I'd take an AR. Of course that didn't work out so well for our forces in Vietnam or Somalia.

So instead of coming down like a ton of bricks on a AK "heretic," I'd be excited that there's another 6.5 Grendel flavor available, which, after all, was derived from the hated 7.62x39 to begin with.

Of course, I would also be concerned for our armed forces if our adversaries switched to the 6.5 Grendel or a similar cartridge while we're still fielding the band aided M4 and 5.56.

[Christopher67]

Wow...and to think this thread started out as a inquiry on 6.5 Grendel accuracy in a Vepr (sorry, only have @ 50 rounds through mine so far, so the jury is still out). But for some reason the AR aficionados want to swoop in and nip heresy in the bud. So enamored by the AR, I don't know why the should care about the Vepr other than to enforce AR Group Think.

Sorry, I just don't buy it, even with my limited experience over the past 30 years. I've had supposedly quality ARs (Colts and Armalites) that short stroked and ate their gas rings while a cheap $189 Chinese AK kept on shooting with little or no maintenance and pretty damned accurately, with better triggers than the litigation-fearing AR manufacturers. I'm going to have to dig up the article where the powers that be decided that the reliability threshold for their designated gravy train rifle (the "improved" M4A1) was only 450 rounds between stoppages. Is that acceptable for a combat rifle? I guess the idea is to band-aid the M4 and 5.56 into perfection, using our armed forces as beta testers on the battlefield, going on 60+ years now.

For your perusal:

Actually, the reliability issue with the M4 is worse in dusty environments - one stoppage every 68 rounds:

http://www.murdoconline.net/archives/5325.html

Cooking the competition in favor of the "improved" M4A1:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/19/armys-quits-tests-after-competing-rifle-outperform/

US Marines barrier penetration tests (with a 20" bbl M16), AK for the win (or I guess we better hope our enemies don't take cover behind anything harder than plywood):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lprGoEpDXJQ

How the hell can a cheap commie AK go through 300,000 rounds without blowing up - guess it depends on the AK:

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2015/06/03/how-many-rounds-can-an-ak-fire-before-it-breaks-down/

And it still fires...(could an AR survive this?) now if that's not a testament to the design and build quality of the AK, I don't know what is. Of course, most of the US manufactures attempts to build their own AKs have ended in abject failure, so the old com bloc must be doing something right.

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2016/04/12/214905/

Of course, as I stated numerous times, a good AK works for me as a SHTF rifle because they work, they hit hard and they're accurate enough to wreak havoc on my enemies. Perhaps if I had billions of dollars worth of high tech weaponry at my disposal, I'd take an AR. Of course that didn't work out so well for our forces in Vietnam or Somalia.

So instead of coming down like a ton of bricks on a AK "heretic," I'd be excited that there's another 6.5 Grendel flavor available, which, after all, was derived from the hated 7.62x39 to begin with.

Of course, I would also be concerned for our armed forces if our adversaries switched to the 6.5 Grendel or a similar cartridge while we're still fielding the band aided M4 and 5.56.

Boy that escalated quickly lol......

[LR1955]

Guys:

Time to move on. MA, LRRP52, Montana, AH -- thanks for your input to the thread.

MA is right -- this thread is about his problems with his new AK.

MA -- when you figure out why your AK won't shoot to your satisfaction and find a fix, please do start a new thread on it because honestly, we are interested!

LR55