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I recently attended the LAV AK Operator's course in South Hill VA, and had a grand time. I figured I'd do a writeup here as well. I didn't take too many pics on my camera since I was busy looking through my T-1 most of the time, but Templar has some good pictures that he'll hopefully post here later...if not I can always repost some of the ones I pirated from him.
Day One
Larry started out with a safety brief and an exhortation to keep fingers off of triggers and muzzles slung pointing down. The skill level of the attendees ran the gamut from various types of highly proficient armed professionals to some folks that were just getting into evil black rifles and didn't have much trigger time with the AK. Larry saw some crappy accessories and rifles, and let everyone know that there would be some folks that would realize that their gear was unsat by the end of the day.
All drills except for walkback drills on steel were done on cardboard silhouette targets with the standard NRA 6" black bullseye at the center. All rounds were supposed to remain in the black.
Larry was running a pre-89 import ban Chinese Polytech folder as his personal rifle. Back before the ban, they could be had for around $400. A similar rifle now runs around $1500 or so on the market today.
According to Larry, there are 4 main areas where the AK is unique: safety manipulation, reloading, zeroing, and malfunction clearance. We started with manipulation of the safety lever while doing up drills. Larry pointed out that while there are enhanced safety levers like the Blackjack SWIFT (run by yours truly), Krebs, and US PALM that allow the operator to sweep the safety lever down with the trigger finger before engaging, you should learn to operate the stock safety lever as issued as well. The recommended method is to index your social finger between the two tabs on the tip of the safety lever while sweeping the lever with your whole hand with your four fingers extended to the front (for a right handed shooter).
After drilling safety manipulation, we transitioned to reloads. Larry pointed out that a lot of post-89 ban AKs have issues with the mag wells since they're imported with a single-stack mag well and then widened in the States to accept standard mags. Pre-ban rifles with mil-spec mag wells will have an easier time reloading. He illustrated the best method to insert the mag, which involves rolling rifle inboard to index the front of the mag to the front of the mag well, and then pivoting the mag around an imaginary pivot in the top center of the mag, then bringing the rear locking lug up and into the mag well. If not done correctly, you could end up in the unenviable position of having a mag locked into the rear, but not in front, disabling the rifle until you can fix it. Best results are obtained from bringing the mag almost parallel to the barrel before pivoting the rear up and into the mag well. All of the above should be done with the stock firmly affixed to the shoulder or under your strong side armpit. Once the mag is inserted, roll the rifle outboard and run the charging handle to get back in the fight. Larry recommends coming up and over the rifle with the support hand, but allowed for those that wanted to come under the rifle as well.
Larry illustrated three primary methods for ditching and empty mag and inserting a fresh one. The first is the original method that involves working the mag release with the support hand and letting it fall, then retrieving a fresh one and inserting it. The second method that Larry recommends involves retrieving a fresh mag, pushing the mag release with it to release the empty, and inserting the fresh one. (Note I didn't say "bash" out the empty. It wasn't a sharp smack to the mag release the would cause slowdown if it missed.) The third method Larry illustrated involved holding open the bolt with the strong hand (for a righty) which also held the stock indexed against the shoulder, and then inserting a fresh mag with the support hand and letting the bolt shut. I personally found the second method to be fastest, and I found that with the added weight on the AK forend compared to an M4, I needed to put the stock under my armpit during a reload.
After lunch, we performed zeroing. We would have done so earlier, but the range was a solid field of red Virginia clay, and it was wet in the morning. All zeroing on the AK is done with the front sight, which is always adjusted opposite to the direction you want the bullet to strike. (i.e. lower the front sight post to raise the strike, push left to move the strike right, etc). Larry pointed out that the AK has a reputation for being inaccurate because most worldwide users don't zero them. He recommended putting the rear right leaf on "1" and zeroing for POA/POI at 50 yards. We first zeroed at 25, with the goal of putting all rounds slightly low of the bull, then at 50, with the goal of putting the rounds in the center.
Once zeroing was accomplished, we did a few evolutions of shooting from prone, sitting, kneeling, and standing from 50 and 25 yards, with decreasing times to put 10 rounds on target as we got closer. There was a prize for having the fewest rounds outside the black. Yours truly won the prize with 2 rounds outside the black...and I'll post pics later on the Storm Rifle thread of me firing the Sturmgewehr.After that, we did a walkback drill on a 12x12" steel plate, with 2 shots allowed at each distance. I was eliminated from that particular drill at 150 yards because I didn't hold low on the target with my 50/200 zero. As I recall, the day ended shortly after that.
Day Two
On the second day, we started out with a few warmup up drills to get us back into running the safety lever. At this point, my recollection is somewhat fuzzy. I believe we then went into drilling on how to transition to the weak side and shoot from there. Most of us (myself included) hadn't done this much, so there was a lot of shuffling around and awkwardness transitioning. Larry's recommended method is to put the safety on, grasp the mag with the strong hand, and transition your support hand from the forend to the pistol grip while switching your forward foot and stepping out of your sling into a neck loop, sweep the safety off, and engage. I found that my martial arts background helped a bit in this regard, but I still got exhorted to switch my stance a time or two, since the brain was busy with what was going on up top.
Next, Larry illustrated some malfunction drills, which built on the same procedure's we'd learned earlier for reloading. Most malfunctions can be reduced in a similar way to the M4, such as removing the mag and cycling the action to clear a double feed. The AK has the added bonus of possibly getting a round or casing back behind the bolt and to the side of the bolt carrier and binding the action, or getting down into the fire control group and giving you a dead trigger. These last two require removing the top cover to reduce the malfunction. The good news is that an AK can be fired without the top cover once you solve the problem, and Larry illustrated this for us.
We did another walkback drill firing from the weak side only, with good results for the majority of the class.
We also did some transition work with handguns, and Larry did the classic empty casing or coin on the front sight drill to eliminate El Snatcho. Next we worked on shooting on the move, walking both toward and away from the target. This is where accuracy went straight down the crapper for most of us, myself included. We finished up with some team figure eight drills, walking a figure eight around two packs on the ground, and putting rounds into four targets as we moved. Finally we wrapped it up with a final walkback drill, where if you missed your first shot, your second chance had to be taken from the weak side. That was a good finish for me, as I scored the final shot from 200 yards with a weak-side shot.
Additionally, during both days, we performed various team drills with the three teams that we divided up into. It's amazing how to can have "wishful hearing"...hearing the steel ring because you wanted it to and engaging before the guy in front of you has hit twice.
Gear
I signed up for the course back in the spring of this year, so I've been building the gear I needed for a while and refining it.
-- Rifle: Arsenal SLR-106F in 5.56 mm. Larry recommends getting a Valmet or a Galil if you want a 5.56 AK. Also, as a general rule, milled 5.56 AKs are more reliable than stamped ones. Mine is a stamped gun that was one of the earlier ones that had no feed ramp. It took a trip back to Arsenal, and then to VA Arms before it ran 100%, but it ran perfectly in the course. I ran an Aimpoint T-1 on the Ultimak rail, and it gave me excellent results. Despite the 4 MOA dot, I was able to hit the 12x12" plate without too much effort at longer ranges. I ran it with a mix of black and clear Bulgarian Circle 10 5.56 mags.
-- Ammo: PMC Bronze .223. I zeroed with this ammo before the course to ensure it was dialed in at 50 yards. We ended up shooting around 500-550 rounds, by my estimation.
-- Pistol: M&P Pro 9mm w/X300 in Safariland 6004. Thanks to this site, I found that the HK45 4.53" bbl holster with x/300 works perfectly for the M&P. I credit my wife with getting me into the M&P series...I shoot my Glocks ok, but I shoot my M&P so well it's almost unfair.
-- Misc. Gear: For most of the course, I ran a US PALM AK Attack Rack (version 1) chest rig. It worked well, especially with the seat belt pads I fitted over the buckles in the front...for some reason the designers decided to put quick release buckles exactly where the stock should go when shouldering the rifle. I ran a padded Blue Force VCAS sling, and an HSGI padded war belt with three Taco pistol mag pouches, Maxpedition dump pouch, and Blue Force Gear blowout kit pouch with Austere Provisions blowout kit. For most of the second morning, I ran a SKD PIG plate carrier with level IV plates to see how the rifle worked with it...it was heavy, and the AK-100 series stock was a little too long to work comfortably. All in all though, all my gear worked well for me.
Lessons Learned (in no particular order, some from experience and some from watching others)
-- I need to do more dry practice shooting on the move. When you're practicing with nothing in your hands, you feel very smooth, but when there's a red dot in front of you doing a figure eight, it's a little harder. I improved with each evolution, but I could have done it all day and still felt the need to improve.
-- Serpa holsters and derivatives are no-go at Larry's courses. I wouldn't recommend showing up with cheap nylon and velcro stuff either. If your holster has a retention device that you're not used to, you'll shortchange yourself by leaving it unlatched.
-- Zero your rifle with the ammo you'll be using in the course. My T-1 needed a few clicks to one side with the PMC rather than the Brown Bear I'd been blasting with earlier. It makes life easier when you're zeroing on the course.
-- If you have them, bring a bunch of mags, and stuff them the night before. It makes life a lot easier on breaks to not have to stuff mags and just grab another set of full mags. I had 16 for the rifle, but probably would have been fine with 10 or so for each day. I brought 6 for the pistol, and was fine without having to load more (though I ended up reloading a few just in case).
-- Electronic hearing pro is a big help.
-- Wear gloves. The AK platform has lots of sharp edges, and gets pretty hot up front. I've found in my personal experience that although those Oakley gloves with the carbon fiber knuckles look cool, a tightly fitted pair of Mechanix gloves work much better and don't get the stitching on the finger tips ripped out by velcro like the Oakleys. You can even get them in FDE.
-- Bring some sort of shooting mat in case the range is muddy. I used an old bath mat I keep in the trunk for car repairs. Be prepared in case the range is solid mud.
-- If you're going to come to a class, wring out your rifle beforehand. Larry said he sees a lot more junk in his AK classes than others.
It was an excellent course, and there were lots of opportunities to learn from both Larry and a lot of other guys with expertise at the range as well. There were some other great opportunities to shoot some select-fire weapons as well...I highly recommend the course. I learned a lot from just talking to folks at breaks and having lunch with Larry and some of the other guys on the first day. It was great to meet and shoot with some of the guys on here too.
If anybody has anything to add, please post up.
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