The Russian Mosin Nagant Forum

Finally got a day at the range. I haven't been able to shoot the Sino/Soviet SKS I bought LAST SUMMER. I had a bunch of ammo I had picked up during the ammo drought so I decided to try three different brands. All shots were 25 yards. It was a pistol day but I wanted to try the SKS. By the way, the 25yard sight in targets make sighting in the SKS's a 3 to 5 shot job.
The Wolf ammo (the black box) was definitly superior followed by Hot Shot and Tula was pretty bad. I shot 3 rounds of each then shot two more rounds.

Go and find some of this, Yugo M67. The cream of the x39 ammo. Corrosive, but it shoots so nice, and 10 times cleaner, and more accurate than Wolf .

Thanks. I wonder how much "accuracy reputation" for both SKS and AK's is due to the ammo.

I have some of that Yugo ammo on the clip, and I am hoarding it Mosins will behave the same way when you change ammo, so will most any rifle. Minor deviations in powder and bullet weight, tiny, but enough to effect how the ammo will shoot.

polymerase2 wrote:Thanks. I wonder how much "accuracy reputation" for both SKS and AK's is due to the ammo.

I'd say quite a bit, possibly about the best, highest grade ammo you could find is Finnish made Lapua. At one time many years ago, our own Lake City factory produced some, for military testing, you can find it, ok rarely, but it's big $$$ when you do. Neither of the above is shooting ammo now, it's collecting ammo. X39 always been mass produced by the billions, with iffy commie quality control, generally in a steel case no less, not really ever made into a match/target/accuracy round. At the same time, the design of both weapons never was designed for extreme accuracy, with the design of the gas systems and such. Both are well suited in the role of minute of man out to 200yrds.

Two others to find and try, Wolf 154grain, yes, it's out there and Golden Tiger. Those generally rate very high in accuracy, I do like Golden Tiger as well, my second favorite next to the Yugo.

Like JYD stated, each rifle has their favorite, it's basically finding the best balance between accuracy and price.

Wolf, Tula, HotShot, Bear Ammo, all that, I do currently and have shot them, but if I want to see if a particular SKS/AK has hope and promise, I get out a box or two of the Golden Tiger or Yugo.
And a little side note about the Yugo stripper clips, those are bar-none the best I've found, way better than the Chinese or aftermarket wanna be stripper clips.

One thing to keep in mind about Wolf ammo is it can be different from one lot/year to the next. Wolf doesn't make ammo, they contract some of our favorite ammo manufacturers to make it under the Wolf name. I only say this so that in the future if you buy some and your groups suddenly change this may be why. I recently had a friend send me some Golden Tiger and will check it out but I've heard many people talk about how good it is. It's FMJBT for one and is made at the Vympel plant in Russia so it's pretty consistent and should stay that way.

One of the reasons I haven't gone up to an AK (besides the fact they went up $200 overnight) is the SKS is such a nice gun to shoot. I get a machined receiver, semi-auto, and an unmodified battle carbine.
Someday an AK 74 would be a nice addition.

polymerase2 wrote:One of the reasons I haven't gone up to an AK (besides the fact they went up $200 overnight) is the SKS is such a nice gun to shoot. I get a machined receiver, semi-auto, and an unmodified battle carbine.
Someday an AK 74 would be a nice addition.

You got that right. I had an ak, but I really didn't like it at all compared to the sks. Sold it for sks money.

polymerase2 wrote:One of the reasons I haven't gone up to an AK (besides the fact they went up $200 overnight) is the SKS is such a nice gun to shoot. I get a machined receiver, semi-auto, and an unmodified battle carbine.
Someday an AK 74 would be a nice addition.

You can cheat , look at a Vz 58, full machined receiver, very close to an SKS in gas system, Ak capacity with SKS accuracy, best of both worlds. Lighter, yet less recoil than an Ak as well

polymerase2 wrote:Thanks. I wonder how much "accuracy reputation" for both SKS and AK's is due to the ammo.

Quite a bit. The crazy thing is, its determined by the weapon itself as well.

Example, I have an AK that isn't accurate unless it has Ukranian Hot Shot 123grn through it, of all the berdan primed ammo. With Hot Shot, it easily puts groups to 50 yards with iron sights as you did at 25 with Wolf. At 100, I can put them all in a 3 inch target. Without this specific ammo, it basically behaves like the HotShot example you have at 25 yards at 50 yards.

I have a Chinese Type 56 SKS that doesn't really like Hot Shot, but likes Barnaul type ammo (Bear) and Golden Tiger. I have a Russian Type56 SKS that doesn't seem to care - it's accuracy is very good with all the berdan-primed ammo I have tried.

I also have a Mosin M44 that doesn't like any Barnaul ammo, but loves the surplus corrosive ammo, 147grn, that comes out of Romania or Russia.

You might have to play around to find the type of ammo that your weapon really loves. That's a shame, right? You having to send shots downrange all in the name of "testing"?

I got the vz58 a while back. I haven't shot it yet, though.

Hmm, VZ 58. My only concern is they are a CAI build. Any advice, info?

I've heard some pretty good things about the recent Century builds. Very few issues and most seemed quickly resolved with some tweaking, this what my local shop has told me. A local fella purchased one, and he summed it up like this, "Century, finally got one right" My Vz 58, I got from Czechpoint, just before Century offered or started building them. I would like to one day set the two side by side, open them up and see what the differences are, if any, aside from other than where the parts are acquired from.

polymerase2 wrote:One of the reasons I haven't gone up to an AK (besides the fact they went up $200 overnight) is the SKS is such a nice gun to shoot. I get a machined receiver, semi-auto, and an unmodified battle carbine.
Someday an AK 74 would be a nice addition.

An AK 74 would be my last choice. The 5.45X39 ammunition is no longer importable. The Feds shut it down a couple weeks ago. What is in the country right now is what you will have to buy. No more after this is gone.