Price on CETMEs

[Orangejulius]

Anyone know what a fair price for a good to very good Century CETME should run? My local shop has a few in stock, but I'm trying to figure out what I should pay for them.

Thanks! :)

[K.O.A.M.]

Don't buy one unless you can shoot it first. Some of these work fine. A lot have big problems. I wouldn't pay more than $400.

[Orangejulius]

Originally posted by K.O.A.M.
Don't buy one unless you can shoot it first. Some of these work fine. A lot have big problems. I wouldn't pay more than $400.

That's what I'm worried about. The place won't let me shoot them unless I buy them. I'll check the prices... Are there any problem parts I should inspect closely?

[julysol]

These century made rifles are well known for issues, but all can be corrected...with a little patience and dinero ($$)
Some of the issues you might experience are: Out of spec bolt gap (this is the gap between the bolt head and the bolt carrier when in the locked position with spring pressure on it, or thumb pressure if you have the butt off. Easy enough to check with a feeler guage) Warning! Century ground the back of the bolt to get this clearance into spec. on some rifles, which is not the way to do it! IF so, new bolt heads can be had for bout $30 plus ship'n from gunbroker. Over sized rollers can be had also to increase the gap, either plus .2mm or .4mm, had from RoberRTG.com cheap.
Ejection problems typically are dirty chamber flutes and/or the trigger housing not sitting at correct hight for ejector to reach case. You should be able to just flip rifle upside down and inspect how far the ejector reaches into the slot on the bolt when its pulled back. Working the shelf so the housing sits higher should fix that problem. Either use a spacer or weld and file.
Some Cetmes only work with cetme mags and not HK mags, some work fine with either, so besure you first use orig. cetme mags first so you don't think there are feeding problems with the rifle when its just using the incorrect mag. (cetme mags are curved like an AK's, HK are all strait like an FAL 20 rounder.

Some are extremely dirty inside the trigger assembly (and other areas). I found one that century had chopped off some of the rear of the receiver to get the butt assembly to fit right and filled the trigger housing full of metal dust and no body bothered to clean it out, including the purchaser, which eventually broke the firing pin and the firing pin spring (which worked out in my favor! Thats why I got it so f'n cheap!) Just a note, this was one of the cast stainless receivers. And the chop job they did on the back was a joke, not much professionalism in their shop practices.

Sights might not adjust enough to zero. If its just windage, you can torch the front sight to melt the solder and adjust it (may have to drive out sling bolt/rivet thing). This is probably the worst issue with them, just because, in my book, its the hardest to fix. Mine is off by about 1 inch at 100 yards with max adjustment. I'll eventully fix it, but its fine for me right now. Some people have them shooting way high or low, but I've only read of a few like that. Sight bead can be filed down if neccessary, or welded up and filed to make a taller sight, or drilled out and a pin installed of correct hight if it won't adjust further.

Some cycling problems can be traced to bent recoil spring rod. Another easy fix, and not overly expensive.

Also you have to check the gap between the bolt carrier's front end where it almost hits the solid piece in the cocking tube. The gap there should be the same as the bolt gap, minimum. Other wise you could do seriouse damage from the bolt ramming home into that. Century is also known for grinding down the tip of the carrier to make that clearance, which is acceptable. If the gap is too big it will be harder to work the cocking handle (open the action)

There is a big cetme group over at militaryfirearm forum if you want to read up there. I"m probably forgetting something.
But if you are more mechanically inclined than the average joe, these are a steal at the price, A fair price in my book is below 550, and less if it has issues. Any in the 400 range I think are a great deal. Just figure you may have to put up to 100 dollars of new parts in it to get it running flawlessly. So a 400 dollar rifle could add up to 500 if needing work.

And remember, verify the US made parts count before you go putting original wood furniture on it. There were a lot of variences of how many US made parts they put in them. SOme are just at legal limit, others have enough to pull the plastic furniture and exchange it for nice wood and still have an extra US made part or 2 to spare.
Century typically stamps or molds a "C" on thier parts. Sometimes hard to spot.

Another note on a ground bolt head. You don't have to replace it with a new bolt head, you can just calculate how much was ground off and add it to the measurement. I can give you the specs on an unground bolt head if you need to know it.
To tell if the back of the bolt head was ground, you have to remove it and see if there are any signs of grinding on the back face. If its really been ground on, the champfer around the edge will be gone. (wish I had some pics handy to show you) There are pics at the militaryfirearm forum.
If you've never dissassembled an HK or Cetme bolt/carrier before, it first seems like a real pain in the ars. But once you know how to do it right, its a breeze. I actually round off, grind, the sharp ledge of the cetme head simular to that of an HK so it easier to rotate on and off by hand. You can also use an open end wrench on it to rotate it on, I think a 1 inch is the correct size, or there's about.

Hope this gives you a lil insight. And I hope the gun shop folks are nice enough to at least let you tear it down for inspection. If you do find a problem but are willing to fix it, you may get them to lower the price a bit. But good luck on that.

[julysol]

PS: A perfect bolt head gap is said to be right at .018 inchs. (unground head)
But .010-.020 is good. I don't know what absolute minimum is, but I think its .004 but what ever it is, there is argument about it. I've read several diffent suggestions on it. But you don't want a such a small gap either way. You want one in the teens. A larger gap (but in spec) is said to make for a softer shooting rifle and it gives you that much more to play with as the rifle wears down.

[Orangejulius]

You guys rock... I have an FAL and love it, but I've always liked the feel and ability to put a colapsible stock on CETMEs/G3s/HK91. Unfortunately the cheapest G3/HK91 I've seen in the last couple years was over $3000, with original scope and mount/rings. That thing was a beast, but boy oh boy, did I want it. Just not for $3000. :biggrin:

These cheapo CETMEs are very tempting for me to get into, and I don't mind them being a project gun.

I've afraid of feeding my DSA STG58 any steel case ammo because it voids the warranty, and will probably be hard on my favorite rifle. But for $400-$550, I'm not to worried about using cheap ammo in a cheap rifle.

My last question is whether or not I should use steel case (wolf, barnaul) ammo in one of these CETMEs.

Thanks again for your help guys! :bow:

[Ron Walker]

Wholesale on Cetmes has been in the $400 range recently. The ones I've seen for sale with Dealers have been $500 new. As to issues, I've owned two Centuries with no problems with them, but traded them for guns I thought I needed more. I never sell my FALs. But I do kind miss the boom!--sproingg! sound of the HK/Cetme rifles. Ron

[julysol]

Lots of folks use steel cased ammo in thier cetmes with little problems (none serious that I've heard of) You just have to clean the flutes more often. If you clog up the flutes you'll have extraction problems. The laquer on these cases might be a bit harder to get out of the flutes than just powder fouling. But have at it.
The biggest ammo issue with cetmes and HK's is using commercial cased ammo. Seems to have a lot of head seperations with that thinner commercial brass.
If you shoot a lot of 7.62, you might think about getting into reloading.

[julysol]

I've heard that the later century made rifles may have more wear in the bore than the earlier ones. So do a good bore inspection. You may also want to get one that has a muz. brake on it. you can take off the brake and put a US made flash hider on it to get it looking more original. I like the brake on mine, That lil less felt recoil is nice. They left the original threads under the brake. I can't remember if its silver soldered on or blind pined. Theres a thread on the other forum on how to remove it.
I love my FAL and Cetme. They're both great rifles and equally fun to shot. I have no preferance over either one like most do.

[K.O.A.M.]

Binding on the charging handle is the first and most obvious sign of a problem. The second is the bolt gap.

[W.E.G.]

Check the bolt gap for sure.
Should be at least 0.015" to 0.020" on a new build, or I would walk away.

Make sure the forward end of the bolt carrier is NOT resting against the cocking handle assembly when the bolt is fully closed. This will give false bolt gap reading, and will beat the rifle to pieces in a very few number of shots.

When you lever the cocking handle to the 90-degree position, this action should substantially unlock the bolt.

If it still takes King Kong effort on the cocking handle to open the bolt after you have levered the cocking handle to the 90-degree position, walk away.

It would be good to know whether the bolt has been ground. You CANNOT reliably spot a ground bolt unless you disassemble the bolt/carrier assembly. I doubt the dealer will let you do this on a "new" gun unless you speak with a German accent, and wear black T-shirts two sizes to small. In any event, bolt disassembly instructions can be found at
http://www.militaryfirearm.com/Forum/showthread.php?t=638
and
http://www.militaryfirearm.com/Forum/Tanker/bolt1.ram

http://i227.photobucket.com/albums/dd7/rkba2da/rifle%20pics/CETME/bolthead-groundbolt.jpg

Then there is the will-it-eject? issue.
No way to tell unless you fire it.
The cause of this is typically a trigger pack that is installed too low relative to the upper receiver.
Its not a huge job to fix this, but it does take some skilz and understanding.
I won't try to discuss the how-to in this post.

And there is the mag-seating issue.
Some CETME's require you to slam the mag into the mag-well so hard, you might as well be stomping beer cans.
You can dremel all your mags, or you can dremel your receiver.
Your choice.

Oh, and the mis-regulated sights.
From many comments I've seen, its more likely than not that any CETME from Century will have misregulated sights. I wrote a dissertation about mine.
http://www.falfiles.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=2148669#post2148669

http://i227.photobucket.com/albums/dd7/rkba2da/rifle%20pics/CETME/shimmed.jpg

Did I mention that CETME triggers suck massively?
Bill Springfield is reputed to do wonders with CETME triggers.
If you make it that far, you are out of the woods.