Welding rails to a bent AK builder flat

[hypnoman]

You guys are so cool for sharing these wonderful tips!!!

[SJgunguy24]

To dress the welds I used 40 grit ROLOC disks on an angle grinder. The welds will leave some shadows but no different than if you were to spot weld. I usually Duracoat my builds so it never mattered to me.

Use the roloc disks if you can, I use 80, 150, and 240 when dressing welds on Saiga conversions. Thats the only way to get it even accross the face of the entire receiver. Those little dremel drums are nowhere near big enough to make it look good. If you don't have a small angle grinder you can use a flap wheel 120 or finer in a 4 1/2" grinder.

[kcstott]

The only thing with welding inside is not getting carried away.

You can easily weld too much and warp the receiver or spend hours grinding down welds to get clearance back where you need it.

Keep in mind a 1/4 in fillet weld one inch long will with stand about 1500 PSI. depending on the direction of loading. So with four or five little 3/8" long 1/4" fillets spaced out over the length of the rail you'd have plenty of holding power. Welds are very strong even small ones.

If you plug weld, warm the welds up with a torch till red. Then let them cool very slow. This will anneal the welds to a degree and allow the Parkerizing to take better. Hardened material like a raw welds doesn't take a blue or Parkerizing well at all.

[kcstott]

Well I took Toes advice. I welded my rails in from the inside. A little tricky getting the torch in the right spot. But it worked. I have to clean up two little areas and the carrier will clear no problem.
Here a pic.


Ok so they can be welded in from the inside just don't get carried away. Even with a tig two of my welds were just a little to wide and hang up the carrier.

[Alex$]

Kcstott, I weld from inside but avoid across the top of the lower rail like you did just avoid clearance problems.

So far just welding along the lower part of the lower rail has held up well.

[kcstott]

heres the deal.
One: It's an AK
Two: It's under the dust cover
Three: Once it's parked It won't matter
Four: I won't see it so I really don't care

Yeah if this was a machine fixture or a high end part sure I'd take the time to prep everything, lay my welds out, count my dips, Be sure to get proper crater fill.
We won't even talk about not using any pre or post heat Or the fact that it wasn't back gassed and the welds have bad oxidation on the back.

Still not concerned. It's on the inside of my gun and when guys here are suggesting using a Mig or silver brazing I think my tig welds will hold up. Especial since there is very little load on them. the worst load they see is the case smacking the ejector.

[kcstott]

Kcstott, I weld from inside but avoid across the top of the lower rail like you did just avoid clearance problems.

So far just welding along the lower part of the lower rail has held up well.

Yeah the bottom was to damn hard to get to. I did manage to get a few good tack along the bottom for good measure though.
I did keep my beads small so when I do go back to clean them up I won't be removing much material maybe a 1/16" of an inch at the most.