I have one of the Russian variants from the late 1950's and was wondering if anyone has done this.

I am sure someone with a lot of spare time or money has done this, although I cannot think of a good reason why.

There are dimensional differences between the two cases that must be factored in, making the gas system work, and at the end of it all, you still have a poor platform for accuracy (bad trigger, bedding issues, sloppy tolerances, etc.).

This is akin to people blowing $700 to 'accurize' their Mini-14s.

George

The usual cartridge for such a project would be the 5,6 x 39 (aka .220 Russian), or the 9 x 39.

Carcano

The Yugo SKS has a gas shutoff valve and could be operated like a straight pull.

If an SKS is allowed to auto eject, it will really send the brass hard.

The 6mm PPC has a .430" shoulder and the 7.62x39mm has a .396" shoulder that could possibly make some feeding problems.
But if a turned neck 6mm PPC were used, they would probably be fed single shot.

As a present for a benchrest competitor, and gunsmith turned an Arisaka into a benchrest gun. It turned out to be very accurate.

Everytime I think of small caliber projects, I have to remember the perforance I am already getting from my .223 Remington rifles.

A more worthy project of the same scope of work is to rebarrel some old Ruger carbines in 44 mag that have blown the muzzle up from stuck bullets. There are no 44 mag carbine barrels available from Numerich or Ruger. Surplus Marlin 44 mag and 444 barrels are dirt cheap as a starting point.

Why? Seems like a waste of time and money, like George said.

Of course this conversion is entirely possible.

By not drilling a gas port in the barrel, one would automatically have a straight-pull bolt gun, if that is what they wanted. Semi-auto function could be achieved by drilling the gas port hole too small, then enlarging it with hand reamers until the gun operated reliably with the loads being used.

The 7.62x39 brass was used by many in the early days of the 6 PPC as a source of brass so obviously case head diameter is already correct. Length is also very similar. Though shoulder size may or may not cause some feeding problems, they should be fairly easily dealt with if they arise.

The major question, of course, is whether the conversion is worth the cost. If one is doing the conversion himself, the cost need not be very high. Used 6 m/m barrels are available, which could be shortened, rechambered, and installed. PPC reamers can be rented.

Though it would not be my choice, it could make an interesting little "knock about" varminter/plinker with considerably higher velocity and flatter trajectory than the 7.62x39.

I suspect accurizing the rifle would be just as possible as it has been with the M-16, though the learning curve about what needs to be done for better accuracy would be fearsome steep. Many years and many experimenters have all contributed bits and pieces to our knowledge about accurizing the M-16/AR-15. The convertor of either SKS or AK rifles would be pretty much on his own in that respect.

AC