Picked it up 27feb from my local friendly dealer. Overall is looks pretty good. The rifle does NOT appear to have been chipped from steel by chisel wielding Romanians.
The good:
Barrel is cherry, I believe it's unfired.
All number match.
Wood is in new condition.
Finish is decent. It looks like bluing and it's not half bad.
The bad:
Rusty oil in the bolt, receiver, and under the handguards.
Finish on the bipod is not that good. May have problems with the paint bubbling/ rust under the paint.
The ugly:
Front sight base canted to the left, sight slide is maxed out to the right. Not sure if I'm going to be able to zero this one.
Muzzle nut welded on by 'more is better' welder. I've seen better welds done by Chinese welders that only got a bowl of rice and 1/2 an egg each day.
The supplied 40 round mag is snug, the supplied 30 mag and my new Hungarian mags are loose. The mag well was unevenly opened up, apparently to match that 1 Romak mag.
The Tapco piston is welded to the bolt carrier. Better job of welding, but we know that this doesn't make for reliable AKs.
Over assessment:
It's not bad for $520 shipped. It's going to go back for the front sight base cant and the sloppy mag well. I was hoping to avoid the joys of CAIs renowned customer service, but we'll see.
Update with range report.
2 FTFire with Yugo M67 ball from 70 rounds fired. This same ammo has been 100% in my SKS. Accuracy was acceptable at about 4MOA with irons off the bipod. No failures when I deliberately pushed the mag to the limit of its wobble. The rifle was zeroed in windage and required 1 1/2 turn of elevation adjustment. If the FSB was straight the front sight slide would be damn well near centered.
Edit with update:
Contacted the distributor. They are mailing me a shipping label for th return. We'll see how long that takes and what gets fixed.
You can train monkeys to weld:
to Dremel:
and to put on FSBs:
Unfortunately, you can't train them to perform these jobs well. BSW
Update 2apr08: Spoke with the dealer over the phone yesterday. He agreed that the rifle was crap and asked if I wanted a full refund or wanted to try another, hand picked AES-10B. I decided to spin the wheel of fate again and am getting another AES-10B.
The dealer did get me a shipping label for the return (UNLIKE ARSENAL!!!) and is throwing in another 40 round AK mag. I'll update agian when I get the new rifle.
UPDATE 15apr: I got the new AES-10B out to the range yesterday. The rifle performed 100%, windage was spot on(I didn't need to touch it) and elevation was 1 1/2 turns out. The new rifle is also cosmetically much nicer than the original. I suspect a new vodka ration had just come in the factory when the 1st rifle was being built.
I am happy now with my new AES-10B. BSW
BSW