Can the NVA be defined by Machining Methods?

[Loose}{Cannon]

You ever see my brand new in cosmo 1970 jianshe with all late 60s features minus a  milled fcg and one piece gas tube?   Pure evidence of china reusing older versions of components to build a new gun.   

[Loose}{Cannon]

Agreed.  By using the phrase "assembled somewhere else", does that imply that we know where they were assembled in the first place?   

Its kinda like air-dropping a humvee in 3,000 disassembled parts to the Kurds and tell them to have at it.     . What kinda sick definition of help is that?

At some point commonsense and personal belief will reign in...

[martin08]

You ever see my brand new in cosmo 1970 jianshe with all late 60s features minus  milled fcg and one piece gas tube?   Pure evidence of china reusing older versions of components to build a new gun.   

I keep hearing ya.  But I'm not seeing the pics!  Pics!  Pics!

And I understand the 'parts lots from storage' concept.  But there are general breaks in Chinese assembly where we stop seeing one early feature, and start seeing later features - eventually dwindling the early featured parts.

Both of my Star-1 guns are consistent with the features which I have shown, and granted they are only 1,100 numbers apart, but I can find none of my Chinese guns with those features.  None.   So, let's find some of those features and post up pics (like the rear sling swivel on the '58)!!!

[Loose}{Cannon]

1970 1.5MIL - Chinese SKS Guide

[Loose}{Cannon]

Both of my Star-1 guns are consistent with the features which I have shown, and granted they are only 1,100 numbers apart, but I can find none of my Chinese guns with those features.  None.   So, let's find some of those features and post up pics (like the rear sling swivel on the '58)!!!

One issue...


I still have yet to see any differences in the ferrule and all I see in the stripper guide is a dif in depth of cut on whats likely done my hand.   

I see the lightening cut direction (opposite), but ill bet you $10 I'll find one cut that direction that came out of china on a chinese serialed gun.   

[martin08]

1970 1.5MIL - Chinese SKS Guide

Beautiful gun! 

But doesn't have the steep relief cut in the stripper clip guide, nor the sharp-stamped front stock ferrule. 

[Loose}{Cannon]

1970 1.5MIL - Chinese SKS Guide

Beautiful gun! 

But doesn't have the steep relief cut in the stripper clip guide, nor the sharp-stamped front stock ferrule which is a figment of my imagination. 

Fixed it for ya.   Roflmao

[Loose}{Cannon]

So...  Let me see if I got all this straight.   

The chinese sent all these parts down the Ho Chi trail with no ferrules or stripper cuts and said.. "I know your under rolling thunder and all, but make it happen as we did 99% for you and feel you can finish the job for national pride"?     

[Loose}{Cannon]

Since we know China was in possession of Russian parts they held onto and used on chinese guns as late as 12m....  You look at any Russians to see if they have what Im not seeing?

[Loose}{Cannon]

Here ya go.     

[Loose}{Cannon]

Have you looked at a 1964 spike notched ferrule?

[running-man]

This is a good thread, it's nice to see detailed portions of guns that aren't all that common and that 99% of collectors simply don't have access to.  Having said that, I'd caution against reading too much into any one particular detail simply for the fact that the sample set is so small and the variability among Chinese type 56's of the same 'year' is so large.  The question of where the NVAs were produced isn't going to be answered with this thread, but nonetheless it will provide good data that can help get us there.

Here's my take on things:

Bolt carrier lightening cut - the cut is really not fundamentally different between the examples M08 has posted.  The start point, speeds, feeds, and dwell are different and those are operator specific and as LC correctly points out the manual machinery used to make this hardware makes it really difficult to rely on such cosmetic features as an indicator of where something was made.  I've got images of Sino-banians within the same year that have both styles of mill marks.  Unfortunately, this feature isn't one that is typically photographed well by the well intentioned guys who post their guns on boards or in auctions.  Not a lot of detail in many photos I'm afraid, but enough in the three below to see that it's widely variable.

(Click on photos below for full size)


Stripper clip guides - this one is very much like the lightening cut, except to add in even more uncertainty we don't know that these chamfers weren't hand worked into each carrier.  Getting into the stripper slots with a manual mill to create the chamfer is a tough order.  On some I could speculate that a maybe large 1" flat bottomed endmill went in and kissed that sharp edge a bit, but others honestly look like a guy with a well used file went in and went to town.  Indeed, a look over a few hundred bolt carrier tops from my Sino-Banian photo archive shows a pretty wide variation in this feature with some looking very similar to M08s NVA while others look very much like M08s Chinese example.  There are others still that look almost square on top with very little, if any, chamfer generated.   This angle is dependent on setup as well as depth of cut.  Just because of the geometry involved, small variations in angle and depth could lead to the features looking very very different.

(Click on photos below for full size)


Stock ferrule - This one might be more indicative of a true difference.  These parts were forged and then milled to final dimensions (with the cross drilled retaining pin hole and the cleaning rod hole milled in as well).  The oddball 9 mil Chinese M08 posts is a pretty good indication that the dies for this part did indeed change over time and we simply can't take for granted that subtle changes to the ferrule necessarily indicate they were made by a different source. Of course on the flip side we can't say that any changes are meaningless, but it could well be that certain parts assembled onto a gun from XY year were actually fabricated en masse several years before and were simply waiting to be utilized on some assembly line. 

Stock swivel - I've got to agree with LC on this one, it looks like spot weld variations to me.  As the electrodes wore or were swapped out, I could see the shape of it turning from a dot to a rectangle.  Interesting to note that the side swivel on the NVA stocks (among other things like wood type etc) would seem to preclude that the Russians/Romanians/Yugos were involved with these.  Furthermore, the side swivel taken in conjunction with the П battle sight setting really points to the Chinese in my opinion.  Every other indigenous production from EG to NK to Alby had a unique RSL, but these NVAs kept with the standard П just like the early Chinese did...

Stock font - This one again points to the Chinese letter gun series.  With the Chinese letter guns, we see transitions between different types of fonts on original stocks.  The early Chinese builds all had identical fonts up through the 3 mil /26\ series.  The letter guns continued the small 1/5" tall x 1/10" wide font (which looks very similar to the early NVA stock fonts) but we see a definite transition to 1/5" tall x 1/4" wide font along with the a transition to an increased length of the safety finger groove cutout. 

All very good data you've posted here, I'm appreciative of you in bringing it up.  These are only my opinions, but I think the data we do have backs it up quite well.  We try not to get wound around the axle here (well maybe LC does at times  ) but it's nice to have detailed discussions about stuff like this. 

[Loose}{Cannon]

 

We try not to get wound around the axle here (well maybe LC does at times  )

.      You love it
 

Hey...  Threads still open, nothing deleted, and nobody banned.   

[Loose}{Cannon]

To me, the circumstantial evidence is moot and can be debated until the end if time.  I mostly like to look at the hard evidence.  The type of stuff you can see, hold, touch, smell, and taste if you like. 

Board user Saigon was kind enough to post very detailed pics of 5 star1 property marked chinese guns in the past. As a former machinist and having nearly all years of Jianshe production in my collection, It is of my opinion that ALL characteristics are exactly identical to early Chinese rifles of the same time period. All other countries are NOT identical to one another other as the Jianshe guns and the star1 guns are.

Lets get to the meat and potatoes...   

Inspectors within production facilities are assigned oddball stamps in which they apply to components in which they check. This is most commonly dimensions and tolerances of dif portions of a completed component.  This is nothing new and most will say 'welp yeah', but when it comes right down to it.... Its about as close to a smoking gun as you may find. The ability to accurately identify a specific inspection stamp unique to one country and investigate where it is/isn't found. 

I have been sitting on this one for a while..  Below you will see three of Saigons rifles. The center/bottom location of the receiver is where many of said inspection stamps are found, especially on early chinese carbines.  As time progressed in the T56, these dwindled down to almost non existent. 










As you can see in the pics above, they all have a common stamp that looks like half a 'diver down' stamp which are all the exact same size as each other.

Note below pictured on my Chinese 1962 Jianshe '7m' gun having the exact same stamp...   

[carls sks]

good stuff, thanks for sharing everyone.  ............ very nice collection Martin. 

[Loose}{Cannon]

On a lighter note...   Anyone ever taken a look at true-blue indigenous nva firearms of the period?

[Loose}{Cannon]

[martin08]

Thanks for the pics and input RM, LC, et al.

The reason for presenting subtle machining differences which I observed on the two Star-1 guns was to make an attempt to develop a time frame, and the possibility of a dedicated production program...  within China.

The theory that the NVA was a contract run at a Chinese factory is not a new concept.  Here's a link to a thread which I posted almost 4 years ago. 

http://russian-mosin-nagant-forum.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=2468

I wasn't the the first one, the only one, but one of the few who would pitch the Chinese-built theory back then.  And it wasn't always welcome.  But after procuring a Star-1 gun, I couldn't find major part manufacturing differences such as existed on the North Korean or the East German SKS.  The Star-1 was just like a Chinese.

With the presentation of the parts machining practices which I put forth today, are we looking at 6,000 guns which were built in very small lots (as many as the NVA could afford at a time) from 1962 to 1965?

Or are we just looking at four different lots from the same year of production, 1959, 60 or so.

Specimen condition.  When have we ever seen a Star-1 gun which is in the same spectacular condition as some of the Jianshe Arsenal bringbacks from the mid-1960s production.  There are many nearly flawless M21s or 8-14 mil /26\ bringback guns.  But most of the Star-1 guns are really well used, if not abused.  Is it because the Star-1 guns were not built into the 1965 year, but instead had already seen five or more years of jungle carry?  Some food for thought on specimen condition.

[Loose}{Cannon]

Welp...   If is possible the serials simply represent a block of serials not used in early production.

The highest 6digi I have recorded prior to the 2m jump was 411,505.  That leaves almost 600,000 unused serials in the early chinese serial sequence.  No 1m have ever been seen from this time period and dont apply to 1956 so I doubt they would have been used even on the nva.

[running-man]

I've never been a huge fan of simply assigning a '62-'65 date for the NVAs based on the first digits of the S/N.  The continuous incrementing S/N keeps popping up in the back of my mind as totally inconsistent with the way the Chinese have serialized guns from the 6 mil /26\ series (1961 based on the Nth SKS-Files S/N progression theory) onwards.  Maybe it truly is an NVA built gun and the S/N is something they came up with on their own.  It would be very much like what the Albanians came up with, except the Albys used a year suffix instead of a prefix.  The problem is, the Albys have clearly different components and features.  You can differentiate a model 561 against a T56 from 100 feet away.  Not so with an NVA/star 1 marked gun.  Even breaking it down to the side swivel and stock font on some of them doesn't really tell you much.