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How Good is the Cheapest HK MP5 Clone? Century Arms AP5 4.5 inches
Updated
44 months ago
Hey, everybody, welcome back to gun.deals! Today, on the table, we have a Century Arms AP5/P. Let’s get this review started.
As I said, this is the Century Arms AP5/P with a UPC 787450668584, this is actually made by MKE in Turkey and it’s imported by Century Arms into the United States. I kind of converted this back into the version I got when I got this, you’ll see when I was shooting it, I do have this SBR-d and I do have a brace and the vertical foregrip on here, but I wanted to revert this back to show you guys, if you do buy one, what it comes with and things like that.
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Starting right at the back, we do have a little… So, if you don’t want to add a brace or a stock or something you don’t have to, but you do have a sling attachment right here, if you just want to use it like so you can do it, no problems whatsoever.
To change out and put a stock in, this is a BNT stock that I ran in the video, fits great, very sturdy, been a great stock, but if you want to put a brace or a stock on you’re just gonna pop out the two pins, there’s one here and one here, and you would take these out, take this piece out, and stick on whatever piece you’re looking to add.
If you do buy a stock or brace you must buy the version for the MP5/K, SP5/K or clone model, you cannot put an MP5/whatever else on the back here because this version does have the two pins at the back, the MP5 only has on pin, so the stocks, they’re not interchangeable. A lot of other things are interchangeable, but these stocks or braces are not.
Moving along, we’ll just go strip to the top, here we do have a castle sight at the back here, a castle kind of turrets. The sight works great, a lot of people prefer to switch these out and put on the drum sight, which has the circle on it because it’s the original kind of sight on there, but these castle sights, I’m gonna call them castle sights, work great, no problems whatsoever, and it does work in conjunction with your front sight right here.
Up the top, here it got your serial number, and it got branding and things like that up here, MKE, AP5/P. You’ll notice right here, on either side, there’s these two parts where you can attach a clone mount, there’s no Picatinny rail up here, so if you want to add a red dot, if you don’t like this classic iron sight look you can throw on that clone mount, which has a Picatinny rail and you can add that red dot. One thing to bear in mind, once you add that Picatinny rail and a red dot, chances are it’s not going to co-witness with your iron sight, so I would recommend, if you put a sight on make sure it’s QD, so if it ever goes down you can pop it off and then run just straight with your irons.
Moving down you’ll see that we have these kind of two slots. With the two slots on either side, like so, you can actually buy a collapsible stock or brace, which utilizes those, and then you can have that collapsible stock in there if you don’t want a folding stock or something like that. It does give you some other options that you can use for the gun.
Moving down, we do have all polymer lure. The safety is not ambidextrous, but that’s very easy to upgrade if you want to do that, and this is technically the older version of the lure, the newer version actually is more slim-line, it’s straight, there’s no finger grooves and things like that. I actually really like the contouring on these older versions with the finger grooves right here, I think it actually looks much nicer than the plain one, so I do like that.
As I said, it does not have an ambi safety, easy to upgrade. You do have the safety on this side, it is very tactile. The one thing I don’t like is I have medium-sized hands, I cannot manipulate that safety without breaking my grip on the gun to actuate that. It’s pretty easy to fix, you can buy if you want to, I mean, maybe your thumbs are long enough, mine are not, but magpul and things like that have some extended levers that will help mitigate that problem, which will be great for some of us, and it does have a mag release right here.
Again, medium-sized hands, I cannot touch that mag release right there, but that’s ok, I own an SP5 and I’ve never used the mag release button because it does have the paddle right here, which I love. Paddle mags, to me, are super intuitive, really easy to use, I do like that a lot.
Moving down to the trigger, the trigger on these clones, on HK as well, are not fantastic, it’s just the way it is, so don’t expect a match grade trigger, you’re just not gonna get it. You’ve got a little bit of take-up, you feel like you’re at the wall, but it’s just got a little bit more to go, and then you’ve got the break. The break’s not too bad, it’s pretty positive and tactile, you got the reset, a little bit of let out, a little bit of a thunk there, could do with being a little more positive and tactile, but it’s not too bad.
The one thing I’m gonna say is I shot these guns a lot, the clones and my SP5 and things like that, even though the triggers are fantastic when you play with it like this, when you’re out there running and gunning, honestly, I really never noticed, I’m not looking to take precision shots with these guns, but certainly when I’m out and I’m doing some QCB drills and things like that I’ve never ever had a problem with the trigger, so don’t let that out you off, it’s not a big deal.
We come to the magwell, it is not flared and it’s a really tight fit, you’ve got to be really careful to insert that mag because it’s not like an AR-15 and we have the magwell that’s slightly flared out or something like that, so it’s a pretty tight fit, you got to make sure you get that in there.
Talking about the mags, this is made by MKE, honestly, the fit and finish is almost identical to the HK version. These will set you back a little less money, you can pick these up for about 50 bucks, HK will cost you 70/90 bucks, depends when where you buy them and things like that, but they will cost you a little more, these MKE magwells have function flawless for me, no problems whatsoever.
Moving up, again, we’ll come to the handguard right here, there’s just one pin on this side that push through and you’d pull that out and you can change out the handguards to whatever you like. I really like the classic look of the vertical foregrip, I think it just goes really well. This part is actually not HK, it’s made by HKParts, will cost you about 30 bucks, is the upgrade, which I think is extremely reasonable. You can buy the German version, the HKParts, which will fit this and it will cost you about double the price if you want to go that route, but it does come with a standard, has a little piece that comes down here at the stock, so you can get your hand in here, protect it and not get too close to that at the end of your barrel. On the other side here we do have the charging handle, it’s got nice texturing on the front and sides and things like that, and it works awesome.
There’s a couple ways to utilize this charging handle, if you have a 30-round magazine, 99.9% of the time you will be not able to put it in like so on a closed bolt, you typically will have to have this back, so when it comes to reloading, what you’re gonna do is, obviously a click, go out to go back, push up, take your mag out, get your new mag, make sure it obviously goes in it seats, HK slaps, down it goes and you are ready to rock and roll. If you, however, put a mag and it doesn’t have 30 rounds, so you’re just sitting there and you need to rack, you can just pull back and let go and you are ready to go.
Below this handguard we do have a 5.8-inch cold hammer-forged barrel, it has a 1/2x28 thread pitch on the end here. Barrel’s been great, I really do like cold hammer-forged barrels, and with the price of this gun I think having a cold hammer-forged barrel in here is awesome, so very nice. Accuracy has been great for me with these guns, no problems.
At the end here, we do have a tri-lug adapter for your suppressor, so I ran a Dead Air Wolfman, I just put it on, and I turned and it’s locked in place, just a great system, really easy to take on and off, so I really like the tri-lug adapter system. If you don’t have that and if you have, say, a threaded suppressor, you just take off the thread protector, and then you can screw on your suppressor onto the end here, so that works just great also.
Another thing to note about these is, I said they’re made in Turkey, which they are, but they’re actually made on HK equipment, which is awesome, so these are licensed out by HK to MKE to make two HK specs on an HK machinery. That’s phenomenal, it pretty much is close to an HK gun as you can get without having the HK.
Comparing this to my SP5, I think the fit and finish is pretty much the same as my SP5, I really don’t notice any big differences in these guns. If you are a purist and you want those DEE marks on your barrels and your HK branding and things like that, you’re not gonna get those on this gun and it’s going to cost you a lot more to get that.
The HK SP5 is going to run you around, I think I’ve seen them for about 3 200 to 4 000 dollars, so if you want that it’s great, it’s just you’re gonna pay for that, which is fine, I mean, some of you are just gonna want the HK.
The MKE is definitely nothing to sniff at, I have gone through hundreds and hundreds of rounds with the suppressed, unsuppressed, I’ve had zero issues, it’s been absolutely great, it feels like I’m shooting a natural HK roller delayed system and just shoots so nice, such a great gun to shoot.
For me, I think this is a fantastic firearm, I think it comes in at a fantastic value, especially when you compare it to HK. I’m not saying HK is bad, absolutely not, but if you’re on a budget and you don’t want to drop three or four thousand dollars on an SP5K this definitely, I think, will make you very happy. Fantastic price point, zero issues for me, super customizable, there’s tons of aftermarket parts that will fit this because it’s made to HK specs. Very nice firearm, I’m very happy with it, I think if you bought this gun you’d be very happy with it also.
