Kismet, I'm sooo glad you asked this question.
My first SKS was a polytech from China. Polytech is actually a Norinco made to higher standards. After enjoying this gun for a couple years, I sold it. In fact, I've owned and sold 4 SKS's. ( I think- these damn SKS's come and go.) I always get another. I'm getting a Russian this Summer. But my most accurate SKS was a cheap, pinned barrel Chinese. I think it would do better than 2" at 100 yards, and because it was pinned and not the heavier threaded reciever and barrel design, it was light and a joy to carry. Sold it, of course, like all my others, for various reasons. New it cost me 79 dollars.
You've heard someone say get an FNFAL. Yes, I did get 'better' rifles too, but I always came back to the SKS. Why? Because it is indestructable, field accurate, fun and cheap to shoot, and should a civil disturbance arrive, a masterpeice. Yeah, we've got M1A's and FN's and HK's and what not. Imagine an LA riot though, and piling into the car and leaving the city behind. You think all the darling rifles we own we're going to risk being confiscated, ruined, destroyed or left behind? No way. ( and no, people, I'm not saying our Safe Queens wouldn't be called into action) The SKS is the perfect rifle. Clear the street behind you, throw the gun into the gutter, and drive off. Or leave it on the seat beside you. If a cop pulls you over and wants to disarm you because you're a dangerous threat to the Riot, let him have the rifle. No big deal. Even today you can buy one cheaper than 200. Get another.
There are a zillion after market add-ons and parts. In my experience, attempts to make the SKS an AK are unworthy. I've tried the longer mags, and they don't feed as reliably as the original Russian design. The Chinese Military tried to fit AK mags to the weapon and make it fully auto, but the product was unsatisfactory. It has no rotating bolt. It's like a cannon breach; straight in and straight out from the chamber mouth goes the bolt carriage. You gotta like the Russian robust thinking here. I had one of the very rare and original Chineese SKS's designed to accept AK mags. No, not the little carbine, the still rarer full sized rifle. It jammed. It was one tight rifle too. The piston in the gas tube was better fit than any I've ever seen. I think it was pretty much a Chinese military gun with semi auto parts. But the tolerances made it cycle too fast for the action.
The standard SKS, with fixed 10 round mag, is the way to go. Stripper clips make loading very quick.
I've sold many of these SKS's when I worked in the gun store. I've had many more just around in the high desert of Ca. ( Knowledge of- they were everywhere) This was back in the days when the desert was open, you could shoot and camp there without harrassment. (unless of course you camped too close to the local meth lab.)
I once had a campaign slogan that every man, woman and boy should be given a SKS by the US government.
I don't see how you could go wrong with one. Yeah, it's cheap and ugly. It's weight forward design is annoying. When the bolt carriage comes back to your cheek you'll feel it too. But in the words of one non gunner I'd sold an SKS to, "munk, they don't make enough ammo for this rifle for me ever to get bored firing it."
Someone said it was the perfect truck rifle, and he was right. I once read it had replaced the 30/30 in some of our Southern State's PickUp truck racks.
It is the one rifle I distain, but somehow, someway, always end up owning another. There just isn't anything on the market compares with it.
munk
