TexasCHLforum.com

Well my tooling experience with firearms has always been a learning process, but the other day when my Yugo SKS 59/66 arrived, I had to get to work. I got it a bit cheaper since the safety catch spring was missing, but a replacement was included. All I had to do was install it! When a friend and I got to work, we didn't realize one important thing - you need to use a "starter" punch or center punch to get pins moving BEFORE using a regular punch. With the trigger assembly sitting before us, we tried as best we could to get the pins out - fifty years of sitting in the firearm had made them tough as nails. We even designed a little contraption out of wood that would keep the 3/32 punch on center while we hammered into it to get the pin out. Well, the first pin eventually came out - after about an hour. Once we extracted the pin from the wood, we came to see it was BENT! Plus all that hammering made the whole assembly rather awkward - all of this could be avoided if we started with the center punch, which apparently is common knowledge and thus made me feel like a fool.

LESSON: DO NOT start pushing out fifty-year old pins from a collectible rifle using a regular punch - USE THE STARTER / CENTER PUNCH! Tsk tsk for me...

If at first you don't succeed, get a bigger hammer. After all, it would be unheard of to look for guidance before trying to do it ourselves. We're MEN for crying out loud!

Instructions? We ain't got no instructions. We don't need no instructions! I don't have to use any stinkin' instructions!

If ya cant fix it with a hammer, you got an electrical problem