I wasn't crazy about the bayonet-mounting apparatus on the muzzle but otherwise a really liked the Russian SKS I had.
One problem with stock SKS's however is the firing pin. As the bolt slams into battery chambering a new cartridge after firing the inertia of the firing pin, which has no recoil spring, will carry it forward and ding the primer of the new cartridge.
Mine did that, to the point it was a wonder it didn't fire the new cartridge.
Not surprisingly there are a bunch of reports of that happening; either two rounds in quick succession or a whole ten-round clip, full auto.
With that free firing pin they can reportedly also be made to inertia fire if the rifle is dropped.
At the height of the SKS years at least one maker was offering a spring kit to be installed around the firing pin to alleviate this problem.
Birdwatcher
there are a lot of firearms that do NOT have a firing pin return spring, not just the S.K.S.
A lot of these slamfiring episodes in a s.k.s. can be traced back to the owner NOT cleaning the cosmoline out of the channel the pin operates in. It just stick out and slams into the new round.
Translated a lot of people never bothered to clean the gunk out of the gun then are surprised when it slamfires. I have loaded for both the garand and carbine for years without specific hard military primers, without issue. But then I am seating the primers deep to avoid high primers.
