I ended up making most of my own tools. I did buy a bolt cutter rivet tool, a flat bending jig, and a headspace guage. The other stuff is pretty easy to develop if you take your time. I think we ended up making 20+ or so guns. That was back when you could get kits for 100 bucks. They all made up into some nice shooters. Some we just made stock, others got decked out with rails, folding stocks etc. it was a pretty good mix. Never did do any 74s, all 47s. One of may favorites was a Polish under folder. It turned out really nice, it was a great kit to begin with. I used a AK builder flat made just for them.
The biggest bugaboo was getting the rails spot welded in. Finally got the technique down and they ended up working out good. Still seems like it was a long process of putting one together, don't think I ever did one in less than about 8 hours. The last one I did went the quickest. It was on a tapco flat with the pre bent rails. It actually went together really good, used an AMD65 kit on it but swapped out the butt stock. I don't like those wire stocks.