Pointman’s Page

I finally got my 2 babies back from being parkerized and put back together. On the way to the range (about 50 ft from where the pics were taken) I snapped these for my website and thought I’d share. This is a reasonably comprehensive recap of the notes in the various image galleries built along the way during the building process. (bandwidth warning! lots of pics below!)

The Izzy clone is a Tapco Imbel kit. The Israeli specific parts/features are: 1) Wood Buttstock/ferrale/buttplate, 2) Handguards, 3) Mag Release, 4) Charging Handle (forward assist), 5) Carry Handle and 20 Izzy mags. U.S. compliance parts are: 1-3) FSE Hammer/Trigger/Sear, 4) Dan Coonan’s Type 1 Receiver, 5) Tapco Izzy Charging Handle, 6) Pistol Grip (semi only), 7) DSA Short Brake The wood is finished in a mix of Tru Oil and Golden Pecan, then 4 coats of Tru Oil.

I had intended on using an Israeli gas block (taller) and rear sight but doing so would have added over $100 to the cost. And I already have the rear sight! Maybe later…

The G1 is the GunThings kit with wood butt and plastic PG (note the lack of ferrale). US compliance parts are: 1) Dan Coonan’s Type 1 Receiver, 2-4) FSE Hammer/Trigger/Sear, 5) Schneider Machine charging handle, 6) Semi-only pistol grip. The wood is the original wood. It was stripped and refinished with Red Mahogany stain and tung oil mix, buffed with steel wool after a week dry time, then 4 coats of Tru Oil.

The parkerizing is the gray zink, done by AJ of Carmel Blu-Black in Carmel, Indiana (thanks for tip Dave! ).

Except for the noted US parts, all parts from the original kits were used, including the original G1 handguards (after beating out some dings and dents) which were also parkerized.

For headspacing the G1 used a .262 LS and the Izzy Imbel a Brit #4 LS (forget the size now, .264 maybe?). Thumb pressure on Go (1.632?) and the No Go won’t.

You may note the grass needs mowed.. seems I was too preoccupied with these FAL’s to get to that small chore…

Functionality & Range Report:

Function testing was done with some old China Sport (the copper washed cr@p, yes I’ve had it quite awhile, dirty but cheap and functional once upon a time) which is a little poochy (2100-2150fps). The G1 cycles hard and there is some cheek slap that I’ll have to iron out. The Imbel, well, it’s an Imbel and works perfectly.

The Imbel cycles on a setting of 4-1/2, the G1 on 3-1/2. Long experience with the China Sport tells me that with GOOD Nato or commercial ammo I can most likely open the gas up another full point.

At 50 yards with open sights both were easily on paper with the sights centered horizontally and vertically. Both aligned to POI with minor adjustments though I had to put a shorter front on the G1 (from a .20 to a .15) After a few hundred more rounds to finish breaking the edges I’ll throw some optics on each and see what they’ll do.

These targets were cherry-picked, of course!

G1 Group

Izzy Imbel Group

Links to my gallerys, from receiving kits to final parkerizing, if anyone is interested. Sort of a sloppy, semi-complete build history….

Imbel Parts Kits & more parts
The G1 Parts Kits
Refinishing G1 Wood
Refinished Wood
Receivers & Parts
Imbel/Izzy Pre Park’ing
G1 Pre Park’ing
Parked parts, pre-assembly pics
Final Build

Vendors Used:
Tapco for Imbel Kits
GunThings for G1 kits, US parts and tools.
DSA for short brake and a sling for the Izzy.

This is also posted on Fal Files

This entry was posted on Monday, June 9th, 2003 at 12:48 am and is filed under Guns, FN-FAL, WECSOG'ery. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.