It must have taken me a good 2 hours before I got it figured out. There are three possible anchor points for the retainer spring of which you must use at least two with any spring for an AK. These points are the hammer pin, the trigger group pin and the pin on the end of the safety. No matter how I tried, there was either too much tension needed to set the spring or there was none after it was set. Getting it right is important. The retainer spring assures that the hammer and trigger group pins will not come loose and fall out of the AK. After about a half hour of not being able to figure it out, I decided to check the Tapco website to look for the particular type of spring in my AK, to see if they had any instructions on how to set it. Sure enough, they had instructions for both their AK-47 L shaped retention spring and for their AK Wire Retaining Spring but they did not have instructions for the spring that was in my AK. Mine is more similar to the L Shaped pin but definitely not the same. Regardless, it did not fit like either of the two other springs. That all being useless, I continued trying it this way, that way and the other.
They say 'hope springs eternal'. I can tell you: whoever thought that up must have been trying to fit a spring into a gun without knowing how to do it! Not only are there several ways this particular spring might possibly fit, only one of which was correct, but you have to continually reassemble the hammer and trigger group into the receiver to see if you got it right, then take them out again if wrong. That was not only a pain in the neck, it was also a pain in the hand, the left one to be exact. A few times, while fiddling with the hammer, the hammer spring (see the 5th pic), the ends of which are wrapped around the hammer to keep them out of the way while working, sprung! In other words, one of its ends came off of the hammer, flew around due to a good amount of tension in them caused by having wrapped them around the hammer, and then embedded itself into one of my fingers or under a fingernail (depending on which time it was sprung). This happened three times and another two or three times it just whacked me. What a pain in the
After having been frustrated several times, then getting hot under the collar, I decided to give it just one more try and go to bed after that. Hell, was about 0030 hours and I had started cleaning the darned thing when the sun was still up. By the way, a side note, I used gun scrubber to try to remove all the carbon fouling from the gas piston. Didn't work. Neither did Gunzilla gun cleaning solvent that I also used once all the Gunscrubber had dried. Neither did Hoppes #9. (Gunzilla seemed to work best at cleaning the rest of the gun.) Neither did a brass brush. Oh, one other thing about the piston. After I sent the AK to Century Arms for repair, they returned it to me saying they had changed the gas piston among other things - like the trigger group. I distinctly remember asking my son, when I bought the rifle, if he thought the piston face looking to be rough in one area, maybe 15% on its face, would be a problem. It almost looked like chromed over pitting. Well, funny how they supposedly changed the gas piston and it still has identical roughness on the face of it.
Back to the retaining spring. I don't know what it was made me do it but I tried one of the positions for it again. This was about the second or third attempt in said position and this time it worked. I think it worked anyway. The spring is snugly in the grooves of both the hammer pin and the trigger group pin. I guess i should take it to the range today to shoot it to check to see if it falls out or stays in place while firing. This would also mean the AK will need another cleaning and that would be a good thing because I will get to reassemble it after cleaning and replace the spring with the proper position for it still fresh in my mind.That way, by repeating the process I will be able to have it set in memory a little better than after having done it only once; of course, that being if it is in the proper position to begin with. I hope it is.
Disassembly was easy. Reassembly was not so easy but should have been easier except, as I said, I am no gunschmidt! Hopefully it will be easier next time. Everything except for that one spring was a snap and simply because I did not know how to do it beforehand both because the guy who made the video used a spring different from mine and because I could not remember for the life of me how it was set before I took it out - shame on me for that brain fart. Of course, maybe I should have looked for a better set of video instructions than those I found on YouTube. One clue, that I missed, that this was not the best set of videos on the subject should have been clear to me when the guy making it said:
" Like I said, this is a eight handed operation. Push down and just sort of wriggle everything, until you find ah, you'll find ah where it all goes".
Oh well, even if he did not explain the reassembly very well, I cannot fault him for being incorrect in that statement. He was right 100% - at least in my case - I have to admit that.
All the best,
Glenn B
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