Type 63

About the Type 63

The Type 63 is a Chinese gas-operated, selective-fire rifle chambered in 7.62x39mm, adopted by the People's Liberation Army in 1963 as the first domestically designed Chinese service rifle. It combined the wooden stock layout and 20-round magazine concept of the SKS-derived Type 56 carbine with the AK-pattern long-stroke gas piston and rotating bolt of the Type 56 assault rifle, and fed from detachable 20-round box magazines while retaining an integral down-folding bayonet. Western sources frequently and incorrectly label it the Type 68.

Developed after the Sino-Soviet split as China sought a home-grown rifle blending the controllability of the SKS-based Type 56 carbine with the firepower of the AK-based Type 56 assault rifle, the Type 63 was an early indigenous attempt to fuse the two into a single weapon.

Type 63 specifications

Quality control problems during the Cultural Revolution era badly affected production, and the rifle was progressively withdrawn from front-line service from the late 1970s and replaced by the Type 81. Often mislabeled the 'Type 68' in the West.