I got my Skorpion yesterday (day before, technically), and already I've spent about an hour working on it. About 50 minutes of that was mostly because I didn't know what I was doing, but 10 minutes was because of a somewhat legit problem.

Don't read too much into the title, I don't really believe that. I'm actually agnostic.

Anyhow, for some reason, the 61's blowback is quite a bit stronger with the stock extended and unsupported (as in not against my shoulder), but strangely the two halves of the receiver pop off at the back. So the first time this happened, I was a bit surprised, but having read a review on Arnies someplace that mentioned a similar problem with the stock removed, I wasn't too upset. After pulling the gun apart, I had a bit of difficulty trying to put it back together, so I spent a bit of time on that. I can't remember why exactly I had a problem with the hammer mech, but it when I pulled the trigger, the hammer wouldn't fall. So I ended up spending a stupid amount of time trying to figure out why I couldn't get the hammer to work, when finally I figured out that it was just because I had dry-fired the thing, and when I pressed the hammer back to put everything back together, I never reset the mech by pressing the little reset thingy. Then, the little pin and spring set that helps hold the take down pin in place sprung out and onto the floor, so I had to look for that (apparently, not vacuuming my floor for three weeks really wasn't a good idea). Getting all of that back into place was not a picnic either. I was able to learn a few things from the experience though, like what gas system the Vz 61 uses, and how to pull the bolt and blowback mech out.

Earlier today, though, I was letting some one play around with the Skorpion, when suddenly the bolt stayed locked back, even though the follower was locked down. Apparently, the hammer fell before the bolt cycled fully, and prevented it from returning to battery. Not really sure why that happened, but it was an easy fix.

So far it's been pretty fun though, seems to fire at 1000 or so RPM on propane. I've been shooting it with the follower locked down so that I don't need to use BBs, since I probably only have about 1000 left in combination. Hopefully I can a container or two of the cheap ones this weekend. I'm also thinking about making a grip out of wood, but the grip looks a bit intricate in some places, so I'm not sure I can pull it off. It looks like it might be the only way to get a wood one on there; I haven't seen any real steel grips anywhere (I can't be sure they would fit, even if I could find one) and the ones that were made for the Maruzen don't seem to be in stock any place. If worse comes to worst, I could probably paint a wood pattern on there, but I don't think it would be worth it to do that.

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Instead of another entry, I'm just going to update this one.

I took another look at the Skorpion's grip today, and although I think that with enough work I could make one, I'm not sure I'm going to try. The part I'm worried about is the trigger guard, where the grip slides over. Then there's also the general shape of the grip, which I'm not sure i can replicate at least semi-accurately. I did clean up the shop the other day though, so I kind of want to get in there and do something. I also fixed my saw, so maybe I can try that out as well. It's been a little difficult cutting hard woods with a hand saw.

Forgot to mention yesterday that I also bought a KWC green gas conversion valve for CO2 mags, though I'm not really sure why I bought it. I guess mostly to play around with it, though I haven't really been so far. I've only been able to get it to work well with the Sigma, and for some reason the valve's begun leaking with that so I have to soak in steering fluid for a while (which does work really well). One of the things that I want to check is if the setup will work with KWC's external CO2 rig (which I'm still looking for, if anyone has one).