I’m wanting to get my 1st SBR “AK”. I have several Colt AR SBR’s but this is my 1st venture into the AK world. I have read a bunch of old posts trying to get smart on this topic. While I would love to buy an Arsenal factory SBR, they spike the prices up rediculously on these ($2K+). It looks like the Arsenal SLR-107UR is a great starting point for a SBR.
I assume I can remove the barrel and send it to ADCO to have it cut down and rethreaded and if needed have the gas holes resized for the shorter barrel.
SBR’s are an investment and I want quality stuff. I realize that this is a $1500+ project by the time its finished.
Do you guys feel this is a smart approach or are their better ways to get the result I’m looking for?
SBRs are not an investment, unless you find someone with the exact same name as yourself, in the same town, who wants that particular rifle, and is willing to pay more than you did for it. Full-auto is an investment, due to thinning supply and high demand.
That said, it is important to buy quality for your SBR venture because nobody wants to run a cheap weapon that may require total replacement if it fails. You already know this, though, with your aforementioned Colts.
If you can find an SLR-107UR, I doubt that there would ever be a better choice for what you want to do.
Agreed – non-factory SBR’s are not an investment. What I should have said is that home-grown SBRs are a longer-term platform commitment because of the engraving and tax stamp (i.e. the registered lower is worth very little once engraved).
My AR’s are all factory SBRs (Colt 6933’s) and my preference is to buy factory SBRs if the price is reasonable (the Colts cost me $1120 each + tax stamp). It seems that there is not a parallel in the AK world where you can get a “tier 1” factory SBR for under $1200. My limited research points towards cutting down an Arsenal as the best way to get there.
I purchased a factory Arsenal SLR-107UR SBR about 4 years ago and you want be dissatisfied. If the only route is to buy the SLR107-UR and have the barrel cut then so be it. Or wait for one to purchase that is a factory SBR.
Draco’s certainly are a great value for what you get and the ease of SBR, but they also don’t have the side folding poly stock and all associated hardware and receiver mods.
To add those to a Draco you are looking at $250 minimum plus parts. The distance between them begins to narrow rapidly when you compare apples to apples.
If you want the poly stock yep. But when I was looking at sbr aks (before sticking to the ar platform) the ace side folders were my preference over the stock stock.
Arsenal can do some weird things. Don’t forget those 16" barrels with the gas port in the position for a 8.27" barrel are some bastards. They didn’t come off some Izhmash military plant. So who knows who assembled them. Not saying they are bad quality. Just watch out for weird stuff. In my case it was a canted FSB/GB and the FSB/GB was also too far down the barrel.
I know this is fairly common with all AK variants but my 107UR barrel obviously had non-concentric rifling. Looking down the cut off section of barrel with only the naked eye it was apparent the rifling was closer to one side of the barrel and had a thicker wall on the other. Not an issue for me as long as I accept that I’ll never have a suppressor on that rifle.
Drilling the pill out of the GB should also be noted. If you have the tools to do that then chances are you have a lot of the tools required to swap the Draco trunnion for a AK100 style trunnion.
That said that 107UR build has taken a lot of abuse and the only issue I’ve had is the Ultimak coming lose due to not enough loctite on one of the screws. I’d fully recommend that setup to anyone.
Will I do another 107UR build? Doubt it. Will I do a Draco build in the future? Definitely.
That is one messed up rifle. I’ve heard of the cant issue on a fair number of Arsenals and a handful of non-concentric bores. I never heard of the FSB/GB location issue.
Did you find these issues as you were converting the rifle to an SBR? I would have returned it if I hadn’t already started/completed the NFA paperwork process.
