Threading a barrel.

Exspiravit

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Just some encouragement for you guys out there with unthreaded rifles like Veprs, SARs, Maks, and Saigas.

After the first one, it's child's play. I actually borrowed the tools from a forum member years ago (wish I could remember who) to do my first. After that I bought the stuff to keep so when I got a new SAR, I could make it more freedom friendly myself.

There's plenty of vids online to help you through the process, but I'll offer some pointers based on my personal experiences.

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-Make sure you have something to catch oil and metal debris. This is major, because no one likes stepping on tiny metal shards or picking one up in their hand or arm off the work bench.
-Block the barrel with a cleaning patch or something similar so metal bits don't get in it.
-Vise the rifle. Best way I've found is with a magazine vice block. Or, in my case, since I'm lazy and cheap, I use a ProMag for this application that I picked up in a trade years ago. Certainly not going to use it for anything else.
-Getting it started is half the battle. Make sure your tat is not against the face of the barrel.
-Go slow, use lots of Tap Magic.
-Don't try to crank it out in one go. Cut a little, back off a little. Cut a little, back off a little. Clean excess bits of metal off as you go.

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Clean up is actually the worst part.

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Second worst part in my opinion is driving out the FSB pin so you can drop in a detent and spring.
It's a good idea to clean out the channel for the detent and pin as best you can- there may be metal debris, and will certainly be grease in there. I trim a Q-tip for this application.


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With a little patience and a little practice, you do these in 15 mins.
 
I’m glad that this has worked for you, but I recommend a point tool in a lathe because I don’t trust that the bore is concentric to the barrel or that the FSB is both flat and perpendicular to the bore. I also prefer to have a relief cut between the threads and the index surface, in this case the front of the FSB.

What you’re doing will probably work well enough most of the time, but the first time it doesn’t you’ll know because a bullet will exit the side of your suppressor.
 
So far, so good. 3 Maks, 6 SAR's, 2 Saigas, 1 Vepr.
If I were doing this for a suppressor, I'd have a professional do it, but I've had no problems using a variety of muzzle devices.
 
Agreed, even my hamfisted self was able to do this to several rifles with no issues at all.
 
I really, really, really need to finally buck up and do this. Great work as usual @charliesgrave and thanks for the write-up.
 
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