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its about 80% the capability of a 5.56. for rang and velocity. nasty littel round works good for varmet hunting or target. i have been useing a ar pistol in 545 for a few yers for a brush gun works great on the commy rabbits/*****/ wild dogs. the ammo is for the most part corosive you need to clean it daily for three days after you fire or it rusts.
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I have a buddy with a S&W upper in that caliber. He has over 10K through it with no issues at all.
He has it mounted on a LMT lower. He goes to every shooting school and course he can find and uses it.
Its a cheap solution to his shooting appetite for ammo.
His only complaint is the powder (Soviet/Russian) is a slimey greasey residue building kind of stuff and takes
a lot of effort to clean out properly... not to say its bad or nothing... just really a PITA to get off the parts.
For his purposes: every range course for AR platforms on the planet, its a good caliber upper.
As long as the ammo is imported and reasonably to buy, you should have years of good use of your upper.
He has it mounted on a LMT lower. He goes to every shooting school and course he can find and uses it.
Its a cheap solution to his shooting appetite for ammo.
His only complaint is the powder (Soviet/Russian) is a slimey greasey residue building kind of stuff and takes
a lot of effort to clean out properly... not to say its bad or nothing... just really a PITA to get off the parts.
For his purposes: every range course for AR platforms on the planet, its a good caliber upper.
As long as the ammo is imported and reasonably to buy, you should have years of good use of your upper.
Both my S&W 5.45mm uppers worked OK, but I have seen one or two which appeared finicky. I was always able to utilize G.I. 5.56mm magazines by downloading the twenties to 17, the thirties to 25 or so. YMMV, others haven't had as much success, dunno why.
Had one good & one bad C-Products 5.45 mag, each upper came with one when I bought 'em. I also concur with the 80% statement above. And yes, Russian ammo is filthy stuff ..........................
Had one good & one bad C-Products 5.45 mag, each upper came with one when I bought 'em. I also concur with the 80% statement above. And yes, Russian ammo is filthy stuff ..........................
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972 Posts
Mine tends to jam up with the wolf non-corrosive, but runs like a champ with silver bear.
The bolt literally locks up solid with a round in the chamber and will not function with the lacquer coated ammo.
I haven't run real surplus through it yet to avoid the corrosive cleaning issues.
So far so good with the silver bear though.
The parkerized looking mags do better than the painted ones in the S&W upper that I picked up.
The bolt literally locks up solid with a round in the chamber and will not function with the lacquer coated ammo.
I haven't run real surplus through it yet to avoid the corrosive cleaning issues.
So far so good with the silver bear though.
The parkerized looking mags do better than the painted ones in the S&W upper that I picked up.
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3,497 Posts
Yes, just load them two or three rounds less.
your chamber is to tight the assembler left it at minimum speck take it to a smith with the gadges and reemer and have it loosend or just fire 1000 rounds and it will loosen its self. dont worry to much about the rust ishue just cleen it three days in a row after you shoot it.
Whenever I hear/read about the 5.45x39 round that keyholes and people lamenting about it . . . it makes me wonder if such keyholing was the result of the purposeful design aspect with the Russian bullet/cartridge design in the first place? That the bullet's precarious stability with inflicting wounds makes it prone to keyhole?
I'll go out on an opinion limb to say that the 5.45x39 round keyholing is a nature of the beast.
The 5.56x45 round's effectiveness is with its high-speed that creates fragmentation wounding effects when passing through soft materials.
Ah! But the 5.45x39 round is not as quick, and it is steel-jacketed, too, making it less prone to fragmentation upon passing through soft materials. So, did the Russian designers opt for bullet instability for its wounding effectiveness? And was one of the consequences with the instability would be the round's being predisposed to keyholing?
There's been other topic posts that diagramed the wounding characteristics of the 5.45x39 round, which indeed, shows that the bullet's instability is the primary factor with its wounding effectiveness.
Comparing the length of the 5.45 bullet with other .22x diameter bullets . . . it definitely shows the 5.45 bullet is very long in comparison to other bullets of similar diameters. With making the 5.45 bullet a lengthy one [when comparing its aspect ratio to its diameter], does it make the round prone to instability? With keyholing a by-product of such instability?
I feel that the 5.45 round is prone to keyholing because the round is purposely suppose to be unstable upon hitting its target. But does the keyholing take away from its effective accuracy AS A COMBAT RIFLE ROUND!? Remember, the 5.45 is not a varmit or target round, it was designed as a military combat round, PERIOD!
Shooters discover that their 5.45x39 rifle keyholes, and the reason they discover the keyholing is that the keyhole rounds do hit the target. With the 5.45x39 rounds being fire, are the keyholing rounds completely missing the target? If the shooter is discovering the keyholing, then the rounds are hitting the target, albeit to the consternation rifle's owner.
But if keyholing is suppose to be such a woeful bane, those keyholing rounds should miss the target entirely, which would make it difficult for the shooter to know if his rifle/cartridge round is keyholing in the first place. I can understand the frustrations if the keyholing rounds were terribly inaccurate. But the fact that such keyholed rounds are seen on the target, in which the target could be a simiar size as a human torso? Then that MILITARY round has accomplished its purpose.
There's an ancient topic post about the 5.45x39 effective range from last Fall. It shows where the 5.45 round does keyhole, but it still holds a degree of accuracy in doing so. Here is the link to that topic:
http://forums.gunboards.com/showthread.php?243376-Effective-range-of-a-5-45x39-round
The keyholing and the purposeful design of the 5.45x39 round being unstable, could very well explain the lack of bolt rifles for the round. The round just lacks an "nnnth" degree of stability to give it pinpoint accuracy. And people owning bolt rifles want pinpoint accuracy.
I've come to accept the keyholing as a nature of the beast with the 5.45 round. The keyholed rounds does hit the target and not wildly miss it. The effective wounding characteristics of a keyholiing round could be devastating, much more than a .22x round that has slowed enough so that it won't fragment upon penetration.
My apologies for offending the sensibilities of the readers out there. But please understand that the 5.45x39 round was specifically designed for military purposes with being a deliberately unstable round to inflict wounds. The 5.45x39 round is not a derivative of a hunting round as what the western world military rifles are chambered with. So it is my opinion that the expectation of accuracy, with the 5.45x39 round, should be lower than that of western-caliber rifles with a heritage of using rounds with the accuracy for hunting animal game.
I'll go out on an opinion limb to say that the 5.45x39 round keyholing is a nature of the beast.
The 5.56x45 round's effectiveness is with its high-speed that creates fragmentation wounding effects when passing through soft materials.
Ah! But the 5.45x39 round is not as quick, and it is steel-jacketed, too, making it less prone to fragmentation upon passing through soft materials. So, did the Russian designers opt for bullet instability for its wounding effectiveness? And was one of the consequences with the instability would be the round's being predisposed to keyholing?
There's been other topic posts that diagramed the wounding characteristics of the 5.45x39 round, which indeed, shows that the bullet's instability is the primary factor with its wounding effectiveness.
Comparing the length of the 5.45 bullet with other .22x diameter bullets . . . it definitely shows the 5.45 bullet is very long in comparison to other bullets of similar diameters. With making the 5.45 bullet a lengthy one [when comparing its aspect ratio to its diameter], does it make the round prone to instability? With keyholing a by-product of such instability?
I feel that the 5.45 round is prone to keyholing because the round is purposely suppose to be unstable upon hitting its target. But does the keyholing take away from its effective accuracy AS A COMBAT RIFLE ROUND!? Remember, the 5.45 is not a varmit or target round, it was designed as a military combat round, PERIOD!
Shooters discover that their 5.45x39 rifle keyholes, and the reason they discover the keyholing is that the keyhole rounds do hit the target. With the 5.45x39 rounds being fire, are the keyholing rounds completely missing the target? If the shooter is discovering the keyholing, then the rounds are hitting the target, albeit to the consternation rifle's owner.
But if keyholing is suppose to be such a woeful bane, those keyholing rounds should miss the target entirely, which would make it difficult for the shooter to know if his rifle/cartridge round is keyholing in the first place. I can understand the frustrations if the keyholing rounds were terribly inaccurate. But the fact that such keyholed rounds are seen on the target, in which the target could be a simiar size as a human torso? Then that MILITARY round has accomplished its purpose.
There's an ancient topic post about the 5.45x39 effective range from last Fall. It shows where the 5.45 round does keyhole, but it still holds a degree of accuracy in doing so. Here is the link to that topic:
http://forums.gunboards.com/showthread.php?243376-Effective-range-of-a-5-45x39-round
The keyholing and the purposeful design of the 5.45x39 round being unstable, could very well explain the lack of bolt rifles for the round. The round just lacks an "nnnth" degree of stability to give it pinpoint accuracy. And people owning bolt rifles want pinpoint accuracy.
I've come to accept the keyholing as a nature of the beast with the 5.45 round. The keyholed rounds does hit the target and not wildly miss it. The effective wounding characteristics of a keyholiing round could be devastating, much more than a .22x round that has slowed enough so that it won't fragment upon penetration.
My apologies for offending the sensibilities of the readers out there. But please understand that the 5.45x39 round was specifically designed for military purposes with being a deliberately unstable round to inflict wounds. The 5.45x39 round is not a derivative of a hunting round as what the western world military rifles are chambered with. So it is my opinion that the expectation of accuracy, with the 5.45x39 round, should be lower than that of western-caliber rifles with a heritage of using rounds with the accuracy for hunting animal game.
I have five rifles in 5.45mm made in different countries. None keyhole, nor did either of my S&W 5.45 uppers when I had them. With multiple types of commercial & military ball. Plus some HP & SP.
A bullet which keyholes will not be delivered accurately. The projectile is designed to upset & become unstable when it strikes its target, not while it's in flight. Keyholing is a result of Americans failing to properly build a 5.45mm barrel.
I.e., Century's (should never have happened) fiasco with its first Tantal builds.
A bullet which keyholes will not be delivered accurately. The projectile is designed to upset & become unstable when it strikes its target, not while it's in flight. Keyholing is a result of Americans failing to properly build a 5.45mm barrel.
I.e., Century's (should never have happened) fiasco with its first Tantal builds.
I appreciate that after my writing of the juvenile-laced narrative about keyholing that you were very forthright, calm, and sensible with your response.
It's good to know that there are owners of 5.45x39 shoulder fired rifles that don't have keyholing issues. I've read many accounts of people lamenting about it.
My Century 74, from what I could determine was a later build, does it about 40 percent of the time at distances greater than 200 yards. But even those rounds still hit with some accuracy. And compared to what a 7.62x39 does at the same distances of 200 yards and further, the 5.45 round is an improvement.
Maybe the keyholing is not much of an accuracy issue with me since I don't set my expectations too high for anything nowadays. When is comes to the former ComBloc weaponry, I do expect it to be rugged and reliable . . . but with the standards of finish quality and accuracy, I don't set my expectations that high.
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