#Rpk

Admitidlty, I am just now returning from a five-year hiatus away from the AK world, but I still think this is awesome news. K-Var is now selling AK-47 patterned rifles built at the Molot factory in Russia. Obviously due to legal issues, these rifles can’t be imported as pictured – they most likely came in as preassembled parts, sporting versions of VEPR rifles or even pistols and then legally reassembled into traditional fighting rifles.

Our friends at Kalashnikov Concern sent us promotional footage of their new firearms and kindly allowed us to publish it.

Kalashnikov Concern’s newest weapon releases have received quite a lot of attention since they were first shown off at the ARMY 2016 military and technology forum in Moscow, and as the conference winds down, I want to take a more thorough pass through four of these new products from the company. Since we published announcements for three of these new weapons, Maxim Popenker, gun expert and TFB contributor, has published more detailed descriptions of the RPK-16, MA, and SVK rifles on his website, Modern Firearms. Let’s take a look at what he has to teach us about these new weapons:

Here is a cool video of some Russian Special Forces practicing shooting from a seated position in an unstable platform. This simulator gives the shooters a similar sensation to riding in a moving vehicle where they will have to shoot out of. Once they get the basics of firearm manipulation they move onto actually shooting from a moving vehicle and work on lagging their targets. The twin PKPs dumping rounds looks like fun.

An image of a mysterious new Russian machine gun was leaked to the public recently, during a visit to the Kalashnikov factory by Deputy Defense Minister Yuri Borisov. The weapon is an intriguing dual-feed magazine/belt loading gun that features distinctly un-AK-like underbarrel gas tube, as well as integral top and bottom Picatinny-type rails. Little is known about the weapon besides its name which is reportedly “RPK-400” (Ручной пулемёт Калашникова -400, or “Handheld Kalashnikov Machine Gun 400”) EDIT: That is apparently the name of the modernized RPK-74 that is on the far left in the image

Everything on this wall is full auto.

The SlideFire stock is an idea that pushes the boundaries of what the ATF considers acceptable for a Title I firearm. Without diving into the world of the National Firearms Act, a Slide-Fire stock is the closest you can get to a fully automatic weapon of your very own. For the most part, these stocks are just a range toy: With no spring to automatically return the gun to the firing position, constant forward pressure is required to continuously activate the trigger. This makes them impractical as a serious weapon, but quite a lot of fun to shoot.

(This is Part 2 of the TFB Rifle Weight Omnibus. You can read Part 1 here.)

Gun blogger superstar Eric of the Iraqveteran8888 YouTube channel is happy to once again get behind a rifle going cyclic until failure. This time, Eric’s victim is a Vepr 7.62×39 AK rifle made by Molot and modified by Copper Custom. Those who watch these videos should know that burnout tests like this are not particularly safe; parts are liable to fail, rounds cooking off are a virtual guarantee, and they are – natrually – a fire hazard, as well. Having said that, Eric will do it so you don’t have to, so enjoy the video below:

Never having enough ammo to just go out and test this philosophy, I am grateful to our own Ian Mccullum from Forgotten Weapons for experimenting to see if the SlideFire is indeed useful as a support-weapon. Turns-out, yes. While the Slidefire may not simulate full-auto, it does not maintain the POU (dangit… NutNFancy reference) by losing accuracy. On a support weapon, whose job it is to blanket an area with fire, it turns out to be rather effective.

Lindy, who blogs at Vodka and Espresso wrote …

Recently, World Conflict Films promoted some combat footage from a Ukrainian infantry battalion named the “Donbass Battalion” in action against rebels in the Ukraine. Some of the Youtube movie is very revealing as to what the Ukrainan forces are actually using in combat. The video can be watched here. It lasts for 3 minutes and 47 seconds, and is interesting from a military standpoint as to how the Ukrainians conduct their operations. But for the purposes of TFB, we’ll be looking at the small arms in use by the Infantrymen. All of the ensuing pictures are screenshots from the clip about the battalion.