Polish AKM Non-Wirecutter

porterkids · Post by **porterkids** » Thu May 12, 2016 2:12 am

Picked this beauty up several years ago. Only one I've ever seen.

Post by **MDIvie** » Thu May 12, 2016 3:57 am

Nice, love the documentation.

Martin

Post by **Brian** » Thu May 12, 2016 8:16 am

Wow. That is very cool.
Odd that they didn't complete the hook for the wrist strap too. But it is obviously a deliberate variation, enough for them to do a special scabbard and accessories. I'll ask my guys in Poland, but doubt they would know of it either.
It's not in any of the Polish AK bayonet books?

Post by **Mr. B.** » Thu May 12, 2016 6:45 pm

Here are some pictures of pages from 3 of my Polish reference books. Sorry the for the poor pictures, but my scanner, P/C and I are not getting along today. Mike

Post by **Mr. B.** » Thu May 12, 2016 6:48 pm

These are from the first two books. Sorry, They got turned around when downloading ..... things aren't going well today. Mike

Post by **Mr. B.** » Thu May 12, 2016 6:50 pm

OK, here are a couple pages In the third book and close ups. Mike

porterkids · Post by **porterkids** » Thu May 12, 2016 7:17 pm

Could you post a photo of the book cover? Thanks

Post by **Mr. B.** » Thu May 12, 2016 10:48 pm

No problem. Mike

Post by **MDIvie** » Thu May 12, 2016 10:56 pm

I have the 2nd and 3rd books. I plan to translate them someday unless someone already has a translation?

Post by **Mr. B.** » Thu May 12, 2016 11:02 pm

Notice in the first set of pictures that the drawing in one book and the picture in the second book appear to be the same version. It looks like a regular 6H4 hilt complete with the hook on the cross guard. The hanger and rubber insulator look like regular production items as well. Wonder why they would include the rubber insulator on a non-wire cutter scabbard? Also If you look closely you can see a small circle mark on the blade where the blades in the last pictures have a small round hole!? Why the mark or hole? Perhaps there as part of the machining for the pivot slot on a production 6H4 blade blank? Mike

Post by **Mr. B.** » Thu May 12, 2016 11:06 pm

I can read some Polish and do rough translations. Also have a friend here at the Univ. of Iowa that helps out at times and use Google translation too. Usually just for individual articles, etc.. Mike

porterkids · Post by **porterkids** » Fri May 13, 2016 3:57 am

Mr. B. wrote: Also If you look closely you can see a small circle mark on the blade where the blades in the last pictures have a small round hole!? Why the mark or hole? Perhaps there as part of the machining for the pivot slot on a production 6H4 blade blank? Mike

I cant speak specifically about the Polish AKM bayonet, but I know that the US M9 bayonet blade machining process uses the hole in the blade for indexing. Barry Brown (deceased), former owner of Lan-Cay, was asked if he could make a M9 bayonet without the cutter hole. He explained that all of the tooling was set up for the hole and to make the blade without the hole would require all new tooling or a hand made blade.

Post by **Mr. B.** » Fri May 13, 2016 3:23 pm

That's what I thought. Thanks for the semi-confirmation. I would think Poland and all the other ComBloc countries that manufacture the wire cutter bayonets would use procedures similar to the M9 for the blades. It appears Poland was simplifying the 6H4 to cut manufacturing expenses on these bayonets. I understand these prototypes were made up for possible contract sales? They were already less expensive than other typical Type IIs without the saw teeth. By using exiting tooling but eliminating the pivot hole, and the guard hook machining on the bayonet and a different finish.. I wonder why they didn't eliminate the strap hole on the pommel as well? Maybe cost more to eliminate than the savings? They must have considered making large quantities of these variations to justify the savings for all the changes.

They must have made up new or revised the tooling and produced a new end cap to replace the scabbard cutter plate. They could also eliminate the insulator stop on the side of the body. I see two different types of hangers, the traditional Polish snap hook and a fabric one without a snap hook. I would imagine different shaped hanger bars. Could you please post a picture of the back side of the scabbard?

Regardless of which hanger they would use, I would think these bayonets would be somewhat awkward to wear/carry as they would be very top heavy like the Chinese short non-wire cutter bayonets.

Mike

Post by **Mr. B.** » Tue May 17, 2016 5:50 pm

I just found a couple more pictures in my files from 2010. Note sure where they came from, but the drawing appears to be the same one in the Polish book. The picture seems to be of a different one. I have seen pictures of several of this version, maybe some limited product of this one?

The last picture is of a plastic model or Airsoft version of a Polish AKM 6H4 bayonet. I included this because of the similarity of the fabric hanger on the prototype. Also note the fabric wrist strap. The snap hook hanger would be unnecessary on a non-wire cutter bayonet.

Mike

: IMG_0173.JPG (81.23 KiB) Viewed 30015 times

: IMG_0172.JPG (58.03 KiB) Viewed 30015 times

: Polish Plastic 6H4.png (52.61 KiB) Viewed 30015 times

porterkids · Post by **porterkids** » Wed May 18, 2016 2:34 am

Mr. B. wrote: Could you please post a picture of the back side of the scabbard?

Mike

Sorry for the delay. Here you go.

Post by **Mr. B.** » Wed May 18, 2016 4:34 am

Thank you! Very interesting detail not shown in the reference pictures. A revised horseshoe shaped wire bracket for permanent attachment. Makes sense on a non-wire cutter bayonet. Mike