Posted on 09/19/2009 4:30:14 PM PDT by Lurker
I promised a review of my latest firearm acquisition, so here it is.
It's a CZ-82 pistol purchased under my C&R License from J&G Sales in Arizona. The ad promised a CZ-82 in "good to very good" condition, one magazine, a cleaning rod, and a holster.
Here's what I received:
As you can see it's a pistol, magazine, a decent leather holster, and a cleaning rod just as advertised. Total price for one example was $209.00 plus shipping.
I also ordered 500 rounds of Silver Bear 94 grain Jacketed Hollow Point ammunition for $125.00 plus shipping. Extra mags run about $30.00 each, plus shipping.
The pistol arrived within 5 business days and the ammo arrived the same day on a separate UPS truck.
The pistol was 'well oiled' to say the very least, but there was thankfully no trace of cosmoline anywhere. So a thorough cleaning was in order before a trip to the range.
It is an all steel pistol and weighs just a hair under 28 ounces unloaded. It's chambered for the 9X18 Makarov cartridge which is NOT interchangeable with 9MM Luger (Parabellum, or 9X19) ammunition. Use ONLY 9X18 Makarov ammo in this pistol.
The magazine release and the safety are both ambidextrious. The pistol functions in either single action or double action mode. One can safely carry it with a round chambered and the hammer down, with the safety in the "Off" position. Or it can be safely carried "cocked and locked" with the safety in the "On" position. The controls are a bit small, but they're well placed and I had no trouble operating them.
I'd say that this pistol is in 'good to very good' condition. The bore is clean and bright and the pistol shows some honest holster wear as evidenced by this image.
One can easily imagine this thing riding on the hip of a Czech Police Officer or Border Guard every day. Mechanically the pistol is sound. Field stripping it is a breeze. As that information is easily available on the web I won't go into it here.
I started out at 21 feet with a full magazine of the Russian hollow point ammo. I'd have to rate accuracy as pretty darned good for a surplus service pistol.
Here's a pretty typical groupt at 21 feet:
I take complete responsibility for the shots outside the 5X.
The single action trigger pull has some creep but it breaks cleanly. I'd guesstimate it at about 5 pounds or so. The double action pull is pretty long but it also breaks cleanly.
Here's a typical group at 30 feet:
A quick note on loading the magazines. Capacity is 12 rounds, but it's a cast iron b**** to get those last two in there. After 3 or 4 mags I opted to load 10 just to save wear on my thumb. I'm going to look around for a loading tool. Function wasn't affected in the least with 10 rounds instead of 12 in the mag.
Functionally in one hundred rounds I experienced NO failures to fire, NO failures to eject of any kind, and only 2 failures to feed and those were in the first 4 magazines. I discovered the source of that issue. The rounds MUST be seated well against the back of the magazine.
So a quick, sharp rap against the table to insure that the rounds are well seated in the magazine took care of the problem. I experienced no further failures to feed. Not too bad considering this pistol was designed for FMJ ammo.
The feed failures were quickly remedied by a quick rack of the slide and the pistol was back in action.
The 9X18 Russian Silver Bear 94 grain hollow point bullet leaves the barrel at between 935 and 1005 fps according to my chronograph. That's quite a spread but I'm chalking that up to Russian quality control more than anything. This is definetely NOT match grade ammo.
With these figures we're looking at between 180 to 200 ft/lbs of energy delivered. While definetely on the lower end of the scale it's acceptable for self defense work at close range with proper shot placement.
Bottom line? For about $400.00 US I got a good shooting solid little service pistol. This example will get a DuraKoat finish applied (thanks to Squantos for the tip), and ride in the Camelback I keep under the seat in my truck.
While I wouldn't feel as well armed as I would carrying a Colt or Springfield XD in .45, this pistol would certainly be 'good enough' in my view.
I'd recommend picking one or two of these nice little examples of Czech craftsmanship up if you have the opportunity.
You’ve got a point, it’s not in the same league as Nagants and Toks.
Paid a “premium” for mine. Got it at Cabela’s. I was able to get one with very little holster wear because of a helpful salesman. I’m saving my 1000 rounds of Silver Bear for any future non supervised opportunities. I use Sellier & Bellot at my range because they are not fond of anything other than brass cases. The funny thing is that it came with a holster marked CZ75 so I got one of those on Friday. Any body have a good 9X19 source.
Google for : Cheaper than dirt or Sportsman's guide Two good sources are
I got mine at J&G Sales in Arizona. Link here.
L
All in all I think they're nice little pistols for the money.
I have no feed/extraction problems with any ammo. The only pistol I'm more accurate with is my Bersa Thunder .380. It's uncanny. 10 yards and an expanded hole in the 10 ring offhand. The thing that surprised me is that for me, the Thunder was easy to limp wrist offhand.
Back on topic, the only gun more fun to shoot for me than the CZ82 is the CZ 52.
Another poster on this board is in the market for a 52. I checked with the gun store I did this evaluation at to see if they had one in stock.
They said they get them in from time to time, but they didn’t have one for me to check out.
Forgot to ping you to the thread!
What’s the difference between the 82 an the 83 Lurker ? I ordered the 82.
Great review friend.
Thanks for your time an effort !
It's also finished a heck of a lot nicer, and there are some cosmetic differences. IMO it's an 'updated' 82 for the commercial market.
That's about it as far as I can tell.
And you're quite welcome. Grab a couple of these while you can. I think they're worth it.
The CZ-52 is a pretty nice old handgun also that can be found for $200 or so. Shoots 7.62x25 Tokarev, which Sportsman’s Guide sells really cheap - older military ball ammo is under 10 cents a round.
This guy has a multiple part series on gun smithing and Parkerizing his CZ 82.
Thanks very much for that.
Another poster on the board is looking for one of those. I haven’t run across one yet and they seem to be unavailable from C&R sellers these days.
But I’ve heard very good things about them.
They are nice pistols. Very solidly built. If you can remember who that poster is, ping hm to this. I don’t know any web C&R places with them always in stock, but he should be able to find some choices at a gun show. I got mine at a middling monthly show here in Austin. I’d consider it good to very good shape - shoots about like what you showed. Came with 2 mags, cleaning rod and the old leather holster (also in quite good shape) for $220.
Then I picked up a brand new, old stock barrel from Sportsman’s Guide for another $30. Don’t really need it right now, but at 10 cents a round I’ll need it eventually.
Only bad thing is the primers on those cheap rounds are corrosive, but the 52 field strips real easy, and a little Windex then WD-40 shortly after shooting takes care of that.
You can get a box at the gunshow for $7-$9
The owner needs to get a few more magazines as soon as he can. Id never buy any sort of high capacity handgun without at least four mags for it.
Magazines can break, get lost or stolen. Remember the period during the clinton ugly gun ban when 13-14-15 round magazines were hard to come by?
Ping
This is one of my regular carrys.
A Great pistol. The Czechs expounded on 60 years of KGB success
Mak is 9x18 but its actually fatter that 9x19 Nato.
It delivers a wollap
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