What to build next?**Imbel FAL**

was it you i talked to about heat treating lol...

i can give you some advice on the cetme c build. ive built 2 and 2 hk33's.
press the barrel in the truinion out side the gun, check bolt gap, clamp in the receiver check again with hammer dropped. press out or in as needed. i then pin the barrels out side of the gun.
barrels are like 100-150 check apex daily lol. i need to get one for my bro.

i just picked up a cetme L kit. its going to be interesting doing a a/b with my hk33. kinda funny being 20-30 years newer deigns its odd the direction they went. scaling it down was smart at least lol.
 
I'm curious why the CETME is so much cheaper than the HK91 kits. It's mostly the same parts. Does the HK stamp really induce the bigger pricetag?

It’s because century arms unloaded a bunch of horrible cetme semis on the market the gun gets a bad rap because of them. A lot of people have referred to them as shitme because of them, but that doesn’t necessarily make the design inherently bad.

I’d love to build one, but receivers are hard to come by.
So you can’t make your own receiver somehow? No 80% fal option?
 
It’s because century arms unloaded a bunch of horrible cetme semis on the market the gun gets a bad rap because of them. A lot of people have referred to them as shitme because of them, but that doesn’t necessarily make the design inherently bad.


So you can’t make your own receiver somehow? No 80% fal option?
80% are out there, I have two of them but they're more like 50-60% and require quite a bit of work not to mention heat treatment when done. Most guys estimate about 40 hours into finishing one.
 
was it you i talked to about heat treating lol...

i can give you some advice on the cetme c build. ive built 2 and 2 hk33's.
press the barrel in the truinion out side the gun, check bolt gap, clamp in the receiver check again with hammer dropped. press out or in as needed. i then pin the barrels out side of the gun.
barrels are like 100-150 check apex daily lol. i need to get one for my bro.

i just picked up a cetme L kit. its going to be interesting doing a a/b with my hk33. kinda funny being 20-30 years newer deigns its odd the direction they went. scaling it down was smart at least lol.
Yeah we talked about it a while ago. Still have the oven if you need it. Thank you for the advice! I managed to grab a barrel from Sarco a couple weeks ago, Apex said maybe they will have some in 6-8weeks. IMG_20200521_111055.jpg
 
On a side note, the magazine release spring that came with my kit is junk so naturally I went looking for springs and saw DSA ambi mag release. Do any of you guys use it? Like it? I believe all I need is the mag spring, torque barrel down, check headspace and order the correct locking shoulder before I can function test at the range.

Also does anyone have a barrel/receiver wrench I can borrow before I buy or make one?
 
On a side note, the magazine release spring that came with my kit is junk so naturally I went looking for springs and saw DSA ambi mag release. Do any of you guys use it? Like it? I believe all I need is the mag spring, torque barrel down, check headspace and order the correct locking shoulder before I can function test at the range.

I have one on my "Baby Yoda." For right-handed shooters who use the right-handed side of the mag release, its a vast improvement over the regular, tiny, sharp FAL mag release. Makes mag changes easier and faster. Generally much easier to engage.

For left-handed shooters, the left-side mag release is almost f*cking useless, as @daekken can attest to.

If you're open to making DSA upgrades to your FAL, I suggest:

*The extended safety
*The pic-rail dust cover
*The ambi mag release or just a big right-handed one

That'll give you a much easier to run gun if you ever want to take a FAL off a bench and into a more challenging environment. The extended safety is very easy to switch on and off and allows you to maintain your grip and sight picture with no issues. The pic-rail dust cover is a really nice way to mount optics. The mag release upgrade, for a right-handed shooter, is nice as well.
 
It’s because century arms unloaded a bunch of horrible cetme semis on the market the gun gets a bad rap because of them. A lot of people have referred to them as shitme because of them, but that doesn’t necessarily make the design inherently bad.
sorta american made cetme c's vs a hk clone generally cost less because of century f*** up is true. it also has effected ones built by other builders on the used market. century dumped alot of parts they did things to, like grinding bolts vs adjusting barrel placement for bolt gap(roller lock head space) or modding them to work with a g3 cocking setup vs cetme.
most of these were bought up by ptr and other companys vs being on the open market for the home builder luckily. this doesn't just effect cetme c's. they did things to hk kits in the 3 main caliber 308/556/9mm. its why you can find some ptr and a few american companys guns being sold as kits. there was a batch of 556 pistol kits missing parts mostly trigger groups and other small parts i believe they were ptr guns that they chose to scrap and save smaller parts. some of the 308 guns being sold by builders as a hk91 clone are really a hybrid of cetme and hk parts. not all parts are swapable ie bolts and trunions and recoil springs for example. then you have the obvious different parts front sight and rear. they use alot of the cetme internal parts and use hk external parts or reproduction. so alot of times you think your buying a hk308 cause it looks like one but really its just a mix of parts .

the cetme kits as a whole are cheaper not because of century tho. the kits are cheaper for a few reasons part of it is the willingness of importation/selling as kits. there's just a lot more cetme c parts kit in the market. funny thing is the price of a legit semi cetme that was imported is often higher then a real hk91 because there was far less.
 
Any of you guys happen to have a FAL barrel vise and receiver wrench I might be able to borrow? I was going to make the wrench on our laser at work but we just received a huge order and it's backlogged for weeks now.
 
Thanks, I didn't want to spend $75 for a wrench I'll only use once or twice. Instead I used the $1.2m laser to make one on company time lol.
 
When I did mine, and didn't have access to a $1.2m laser, I made one from a block of oak. Sadly, I just took a look and couldn't find it.

Yours looks really nice...
 
Well the barrel wrench worked great, I started tightening and soon realized that even though everyone said it shouldn't be a issue timing a little early, it was in fact a issue and I wasn't comfortable with the amount of torque I was putting on it. Ended up taking it apart and using a 5" sanding disk to take it down some. I widened the center a bit to fit over the barrel threads and then screwed on the receiver to add tension while turning the disk by hand, came out perfect.

For timing I removed the front sight post and put a gauge block along the top flat while using a digital protractor I borrowed from our QC department. I torqued down the barrel until the flat and the flat of the receiver were identical.

I was also able to check headspace last night, ended up with a .261 pin using a Forster .308 Go gauge, 1.630. wanting HS to be 1.632 I then -.002 from the pin(.259) and then added .001 for run in. Based on math I need a .260 locking shoulder which I ordered from ARS last night. Hopefully it'll be in Saturday and test firing on Sunday.
 
Sounds like you're well on your way to pew pew!!

I do miss having access to the talent and tools from Air Guard maintenance. Our machine shop was willing to work on a lot of things that weren't strictly aircraft related since many tasks they were required to qualify on rarely came up in actual maintenance. I haven't seen a digital protractor since then. I used a couple pieces of drill rod to level out the receiver and front sight, which was effective but nowhere near as cool as having access to a digital protractor and laser machining.
 
Well some good news and bad news. Good news is I got the shoot my FAL a tiny bit tonight. The bolt itself fits the locking shoulder perfectly but the carrier just want seating forward all the way like it should. I did a little filing and it fits enough to where I was comfortable going to the range and taking some shots even though it was very tight. The plus side is it goes BANG! The downside is the ejection was 50/50, I have it adjusted down to a 2 or 3 right now and it seemed to start functioning fine and working semi auto. When it wouldn't eject, the bolt would be pushed back about 3/4" and then be jammed up pretty good. Only got 30rds down before I ran out of daylight. I ran the bolt pretty wet too. When I switched the gas plug from A to G obviously I bypassed the gas system but the bolt was smooth for extraction. Hoping to get back to the range before the weekend and get some more time with it.
 
Well some good news and bad news. Good news is I got the shoot my FAL a tiny bit tonight. The bolt itself fits the locking shoulder perfectly but the carrier just want seating forward all the way like it should. I did a little filing and it fits enough to where I was comfortable going to the range and taking some shots even though it was very tight. The plus side is it goes BANG! The downside is the ejection was 50/50, I have it adjusted down to a 2 or 3 right now and it seemed to start functioning fine and working semi auto. When it wouldn't eject, the bolt would be pushed back about 3/4" and then be jammed up pretty good. Only got 30rds down before I ran out of daylight. I ran the bolt pretty wet too. When I switched the gas plug from A to G obviously I bypassed the gas system but the bolt was smooth for extraction. Hoping to get back to the range before the weekend and get some more time with it.

Just for curiosity's sake, what ammo were you shooting? You did the "start at 7, then work your way down progressively" method, right?
 
I was using Federal XM80 ammo. I started at 7 and worked down. If I take the bolt out and drop it in it fits beautifully between the gage and the locking shoulder, the carrier travels freely as well. But as soon as I put the bolt back in the carrier and cycle it, it gets really stiff before it closes all the way. The bolt and carrier are not numbers matching if it matters.
 
I was using Federal XM80 ammo. I started at 7 and worked down. If I take the bolt out and drop it in it fits beautifully between the gage and the locking shoulder, the carrier travels freely as well. But as soon as I put the bolt back in the carrier and cycle it, it gets really stiff before it closes all the way. The bolt and carrier are not numbers matching if it matters.

Ok, so ammo's likely not the issue. If you use the bolt release, rather than hand cycling, does it fly forward freely, without feeding issues?

Post no. 3 here by "MAINER" is likely a good start to remedying this:

stiff charging operation - The FAL Files
 
It fly's freely fine, the carrier itself wasn't locking forward all the way when I would hit the bolt release, I worked it back and forth a bunch and got it to close eventhough it was a bit tight. I'm going to follow what's in the Gunplumber book and lap the bolt carrier with the locking shoulder.

"
If your bolt will not drop into place, but will close with moderate pressure, you may not want to risk
breaking the locking shoulder by removing it again. Apply liberal amounts of lapping compound to
the bolt locking surface and the locking shoulder, and with a case in the chamber (no extractor) slam
the bolt home repeatedly. Note that I wrote "a case" and not "a live round." Do not use your gauge.
Go to the range and fire your completely assembled single shot rifle with liberal amounts of lapping
compound and with the gas at the lowest setting (0 or 1) until the parts lap into place and make it a
self-loader again. Usually 10 - 20 rounds. "
 
Got back to the range today, gas block adjusted to 0 and hand fed a couple rounds one by one on a empty magazine. Then I started loading 3-4 rounds per magazine to check function. Was a little fussy at first but after the 20 rounds or so it was firing beautifully as a semi auto. Tried adjusting the gas system a little and it didn't want to cycle much so I settled on 1 for now until things break in further. There was a piece of club steel down at 100 yards and sure as shit, put it in my sights and let the freedom ring with no effort, didn't move the sights at all from how I got the parts kit. Very happy with the build so far. IMG_20200616_200025.jpg
 
Got back to the range today, gas block adjusted to 0 and hand fed a couple rounds one by one on a empty magazine. Then I started loading 3-4 rounds per magazine to check function. Was a little fussy at first but after the 20 rounds or so it was firing beautifully as a semi auto. Tried adjusting the gas system a little and it didn't want to cycle much so I settled on 1 for now until things break in further. There was a piece of club steel down at 100 yards and sure as shit, put it in my sights and let the freedom ring with no effort, didn't move the sights at all from how I got the parts kit. Very happy with the build so far. View attachment 366319
need baby poop paint
 
Got back to the range today, gas block adjusted to 0 and hand fed a couple rounds one by one on a empty magazine. Then I started loading 3-4 rounds per magazine to check function. Was a little fussy at first but after the 20 rounds or so it was firing beautifully as a semi auto. Tried adjusting the gas system a little and it didn't want to cycle much so I settled on 1 for now until things break in further. There was a piece of club steel down at 100 yards and sure as shit, put it in my sights and let the freedom ring with no effort, didn't move the sights at all from how I got the parts kit. Very happy with the build so far. View attachment 366319
Looks like a classic mil-spec FAL to me! Awesome job! I would not be able to build one from scratch like you did.👌
 
Looks like a classic mil-spec FAL to me! Awesome job! I would not be able to build one from scratch like you did.👌
I got some big help with the DSA receiver, after that it wasn't too much work at all. The DSA was cheating really but I plan to machine the other receivers over the summer when I have some time.
 
I got some big help with the DSA receiver, after that it wasn't too much work at all. The DSA was cheating really but I plan to machine the other receivers over the summer when I have some time.

Got any ideas for future builds?
 
Back
Top Bottom