Pair of Norinco Type 54s

[Greasemonkey]

I ordered 2 these Type 54 Tokarevs C&R back in March from Aim Surplus, each came with 1 magazine. I did get lucky and get both with matching star grip panels, some didn't have matching ones. I wasn't disappointed, looks like they have both been refurbed...somewhere, they are very tight to work the action on. Of course they had the safety feature installed on the trigger...kind of like a Glock..only even more pointless/useless in my opinion.. The serial number range I got was a 5 million from Factory 66 dated 1958 all the way to a 31 million series with no factory or date. The finishes between the two are also different, the early one is more of a parkerized finish, the later is more blued. Slide serial font and symbol impression changed as well. Both bores are good with some slight haze in the grooves. RGuns was the importer, they used a small mark on the bottom, not a huge billboard.

[Bob_The_Student]

 

[running-man]

Nice pair for certain! 

What spare trigger parts would you need to swap out in order to return the safety monstrosity back to factory stock? (or is that even possible?)

[Greasemonkey]

Been tempted to try to just remove it.. haven't had much time.

[carls sks]

nice! your going to need a bigger safe.

[Phosphorus32]

Nice, presumably the 31 series is 1984...Orwellian 

I think all you have to do is replace the trigger, but I'm not certain. Trouble is that everyone wants to do that and those stock Tokarev triggers have become scarce and expensive 

I don't know why the old half-cock mechanism was deemed insufficient, especially compared to the crappy ad hoc designs they've installed over the years.

[Greasemonkey]

Nice, presumably the 31 series is 1984...Orwellian 

I think all you have to do is replace the trigger, but I'm not certain. Trouble is that everyone wants to do that and those stock Tokarev triggers have become scarce and expensive 

I don't know why the old half-cock mechanism was deemed insufficient, especially compared to the crappy ad hoc designs they've installed over the years.

One thought...  I do, do that at times... I did have was just get it depressed fully, drill with like a 1/16 bit and pin it in the released position. Defiantly a poor cheesy design.

1984.. also Van Halen..ish...

[pcke2000]

Nice, presumably the 31 series is 1984...Orwellian 

I think all you have to do is replace the trigger, but I'm not certain. Trouble is that everyone wants to do that and those stock Tokarev triggers have become scarce and expensive 

I don't know why the old half-cock mechanism was deemed insufficient, especially compared to the crappy ad hoc designs they've installed over the years.

One thought...  I do, do that at times... I did have was just get it depressed fully, drill with like a 1/16 bit and pin it in the released position. Defiantly a poor cheesy design.

1984.. also Van Halen..ish...

Would you mind showing a pic of the rear ends of hammer assembly rails? Your 31 million may have original blue finish.

[Direct Connection]

I been lurking at buying one of those from AIM. But Im seriously thinking of selling my 2 Yugos and a Romanian. Keeping the Polish. I think they would ship one of those chi-coms to Ca.

They are nice for sure and im sure you have plenty of ammo. They are the fastest bullet and so much fun to shoot. I took the safety's off my Yugos and they both shoot flawlessly. These seem more complex. You did good. For a long time these havent been available and now you have 2. Thats a good thing   

[Boris Badinov]

Very Nice, GM!!

Do we have any idea where these Type54's are coming from?

[Greasemonkey]

Would you mind showing a pic of the rear ends of hammer assembly rails? Your 31 million may have original blue finish.

I'll dig it back out and get a shot.. 

Very Nice, GM!!

Do we have any idea where these Type54's are coming from?

Thanks... I want to say maybe where the SKS's are coming from...but that doesn't explain the refurb job thats been done.

[Greasemonkey]

31million Hammer assembly

[Direct Connection]

Every balken / Chinese soldier wasn't a GM McIver when they had problems with their side arm.  So they just made things simple with that entire assembly replacement.

How many Tokarevs ? No group pics ? 

[Boris Badinov]

Very Nice.

Where are these coming from. Is there any information on the exporters?

[Matchka]

What Boris said.

[BMont]

Very nice... makes me think I should pick up another one before this batch is gone.  Thanks for sharing.

[Phosphorus32]

Very Nice.

Where are these coming from. Is there any information on the exporters?

Still a mystery.

The only imports I find for R-Guns are from IMI. It seems somewhat odd that these Type 54s would have come from Israel. One hypothesis would be that they were captured from Egyptian, Lebanese, Palestinian, other Arab neighbors as recently as 1984 (given the 31 year codes observed), held by IWI then IMI after IWI was privatized, and sold to R-Guns recently. Another hypothesis is that the import genius website is incomplete and they came from some other country, whose sale to R-Guns wasn't recorded.

https://www.importgenius.com/importers/r-guns-sportwereus-inc

[Boris Badinov]

Thanks, phos!!

The Israeli connection hypothesis has some merit. And it makes a lot of sense. Although, that's quite a long time to hold on to so many type54's, no?

I've heard Albania suggested as well. But if that were true, wouldn't we have seen them before now? Or might the costs of trigger modifications have been the kind of thing that drove importers away from the 54-- you know because the type56's were a much simpler endeavor. No mods. No cleaning. Just  sort, pack and ship.

[pcke2000]

Thanks, phos!!

The Israeli connection hypothesis has some merit. And it makes a lot of sense. Although, that's quite a long time to hold on to so many type54's, no?

I've heard Albania suggested as well. But if that were true, wouldn't we have seen them before now? Or might the costs of trigger modifications have been the kind of thing that drove importers away from the 54-- you know because the type56's were a much simpler endeavor. No mods. No cleaning. Just  sort, pack and ship.

Interesting observations from this batch: (1) some pistols were made in 1990s (IIRC, China already cut military aid to Albania at the time?); (2) some late (1990s) pistols appear to be in original non-refurb condition, other than extractor painted in red on edges.

[Boris Badinov]

Interesting pcke2000-

There's a  member on a thread at gunboards who says his friend, Bob, played a part in finding these Type54's and he swears that they are coming from Albania.

https://www.gunboards.com/threads/chinese-type-54-rguns.1160161/post-10386293


Could they be 2nd hand aid from another middle-eastern country like Egypt or Iran? Possibly Pakistan?