What would you suggest? Legitimate question....I don't know much about Aks...other than I like em...lol
Most of the AK crowd echoes the
imports > domestics statement when it comes to this question. I am a staunch supporter of this statement. There are always exceptions to any rule (Pioneer Arms, for example - stay farrrr away), but Russian, Bulgarian, Romanian, Hungarian, Polish, Chinese, Yugo/Serbian, etc. etc. models are almost always going to be better than American AKs. For casual shooters who may run a few mags a year through the gun, a PSA will probably be fine. However, owning an AK has a tendency to cause owners to want
more AKs, as you yourself have alluded to, and most American AKs don't have good reputations, resale value, or much interest from folks who want to buy another AK.
You have a WASR-10 (I think, but that photo you posted of the RS Regulate isn't a WASR. It has dimples. Kinda looks like a SAR-1.) which is awesome. Zastava USA makes a solid and affordable shooter with its Serbian ZPAPM70. Yugo/Serbian-pattern guns use proprietary furniture and optic rails, FYI. Atlantic and Arms of America carry WBP and FB branded Polish AKs that are great. Though I generally discourage new AK guys from purchasing second-hand kit builds,
@digitalpaladin10 builds some legit wonderful stuff and sometimes sells his builds in the classifieds here. He can also do custom work for you. I would 100% vouch for him.
If you have deep pockets, I'd add the IWI Galil ACE to your list. Not
quite an AK, but in a lot of ways better. Phenomenal guns. And although I have a lot of higher end AK variants that are now pushing $2,000, $3,000+ in value (Russian VEPRs, Bulgarian SAMs and SLRs, etc.), at the end of the day they don't do much more than a trusty WASR. These days they cater more to the diehard AK collector than a casual shooter.
Like I said, PSA is generally fine by now with its 7.62x39 lineup, but I don't like the company's ethics. They censor mediocre and negative reviews from their website, delete legitimately critical posts and ban legitimately frustrated people on their social media pages, and they pulled out from the AK Files after receiving a lot of well-earned criticism from owners of various PSAK lemons, and then created their own internet forum where they can censor content. PSA also notoriously uses owners as beta testers for its new guns, and those owners inevitably run into all sorts of problems. It's an all around shitty way to do business and treat customers. And although you get a "lifetime warranty," I've heard several anecdotes from owners who still had problems, or had to send their guns back multiple times, or who never got PSA to honor the warranty for a variety of reasons. I understand the turnaround time for warranty work right now is crazy long, which kind of speaks to the amount of problematic guns out there. The PSAK-47 is on its fifth generation (the GF5 series), and generally the GF3, GF4, and GF5 guns are good to go. Just my two cents. I do own a PSAK-
74 and AK-V. Neither of mine have had any problems, but both models have had a wide variety of issues for other owners.
Likewise, Riley has had more than a few growing pains and QC issues and I would never recommend them to a new shooter. And for what it's worth, I wouldn't touch anything domestic made by Century (RAS-47, C39 and C39V2, VSKA, whatever the hell its new BFT-47 is ... probably "Brittle Fuggin' Trunnion," and so on) if you paid me to take it off your hands. Again, that is just my opinion. YMMV.
Also American, Give Kalashnikov-USA a look. I've had one KUSA rifle that I traded, but the fit and finish was quite nice. I am digging the 103 series by the looks of it, and will probably bite the bullet and pick up a 105 clone whenever they release it.
Read through the various threads in the AK section here and you'll start seeing a pattern of what is generally good quality and recommended by the resident CFF AK guys, and what is not. And feel free to ask questions before buying!
