Tarkov | Hideout Side Hustle #1: How the VPO-136 Changed the Way I See the Workbench

When Stash Level 3 Came Into View, I Started Seeing the Hideout Differently

As I kept playing Tarkov, Stash Level 3 was finally starting to come into view.
And then, all of a sudden, I found myself needing money.
The problem was, I could not always set aside enough time to go on proper raids.
So while absentmindedly looking through the Hideout, I had a sudden thought:
Wait… couldn’t this be turned into a business?
When I actually tried it, my funds — which had been sitting at around 8 million roubles — reached 10 million in a single day without going on a single raid.
This series began with that simple realization.
Let me say this first:
this is not a “here’s the perfect money-making method” kind of article.
The more people learn about a method like this, the more downward pressure it will naturally put on prices.
So this is not meant to say, “Do this and you will definitely make money.”
What I want to say instead is that the way you look at the Hideout can completely change how you build up your funds.
For the first article in this series, I want to focus on the Workbench.
And more specifically, a method that works from Workbench Level 1.

Why Is a Gun Like the VPO-136 Even Here?

While looking through the Workbench list, my first reaction was this:
Why is a gun like the VPO-136 even here?
To me, it had always felt like one of those underwhelming guns that Scavs happen to carry.
Honestly, my first thought was, What does something like this even have to do with the Hideout?
But then I looked at it a little more carefully, and something clicked.
Wait… does this mean the VPO-136 can be turned into an AKM?
The VPO-136 seems to be a civilian-market model related to the AKM family.
Apparently it cannot literally be converted into an AKM in real life, but in the game, I think this relationship is being represented in that way.
At that point, you might think the story ends there:
Oh, I see. So it can become an AKM.
But that was not the end of it.

An AKM Can Be Turned Into Five Weapon Parts

An AKM can be processed into 5 Weapon Parts.
So what?
That may be your first reaction.
But as of April 19, 2026, Weapon Parts were trading on the Flea Market for around 20,000 to 27,000 roubles each.
And the VPO-136 can be bought from Skier for 31,198 roubles.
If you turn that into an AKM, then process it into Weapon Parts, and sell those Weapon Parts for 20,000 roubles each, the simple calculation gives you a gross profit of 68,802 roubles.
Of course, you still have to subtract the Flea Market fee.
Even so, if that fee stays somewhere around 5,000 to 7,000 roubles, there is still plenty of profit left.
There is one more important point here.
This is not a case of picking something up in raid, forcing it into a limited bag, and carrying it out.
While an item is being processed in the Workbench, it disappears from your stash temporarily.
That means you do not have to think about profit per inventory slot in quite the same way.
In that sense, it feels very different from deciding what is worth looting during a raid.

Not Just a Calculation — I Actually Tried It

Still, there is always a big difference between:
“It looks profitable on paper”
and
“It was actually profitable when I sold it.”
So I decided to test it for real.
The image above shows the results after one week.
At that point, the total profit had reached 1.94 million roubles.
At the time I first started writing this article, I had completed 4 successful transactions, with profits of roughly 350,000 roubles.
After continuing the method for the rest of the week, that number eventually grew to 1.94 million roubles in profit.

The sheet above is the transaction record as it currently stands.
For the record, there were also times when, due to lack of time, I simply bought AKMs directly and processed them.
Of course, this is only worth doing while the market conditions still allow it to be profitable.
If the method spreads widely enough, prices will eventually move.
Even so, the fact that I could make this much money just by running the Hideout makes it pretty fascinating to me.

I See Scav VPO-136s Very Differently Now

One other thing changed for me as a result of this.
If I see a Scav carrying a VPO-136 from now on, and I still have space on my back, I will probably bring it back without hesitation.
That way, I do not even have to think about acquisition cost — it is almost pure profit at that point.
So this is not just a story of:
“Buy from Skier, process it, and make money.”
It is also a story about how something I used to see as almost worthless suddenly revealed a completely different kind of value once I started looking at it through the Hideout.

What If the Market Collapses?

So what happens if the market for this eventually falls apart?
In that case, I am also thinking:
Why not just craft an AK-74N and use it myself?
The 5.45×39 round seems relatively manageable, and depending on how it is customized, it looks like it could be perfectly usable in practice.
That is something I would like to write about in a future article.

The More I Look at the Hideout, the More I See Ahead

And if I am already running the Generator, it feels like a waste not to make use of the Med Station and Nutrition Unit as well.
I would like to save that part of the story for the second article and beyond in this series.
If this interests you, I would be very happy if you followed or turned on notifications.
And if you have your own little Hideout-based money-making method, I would love to hear about it.

The 2nd story in this series is available here: What TP Made Me Notice About the Nutrition Unit

Note: I also talk about the background behind this series, as well as what I am actually thinking during play, in the streams I do on Twitch almost every day.
Some things are harder to fully convey in writing alone, so watching the streams may help give a better feel for the atmosphere.
Past stream archives are also available on my YouTube channel, so if you are interested, please feel free to check those out as well.

▶ YouTube: B.K. Gaming
▶ Twitch: kaz_the_minotaur