The Russian Mosin Nagant Forum

When the Communists made these guns in the Zastava facility, back in '89 to replace the Tokarev, it would have been a world contender, but their politics went South and they spent too much time killing each other; sanctions killed exports and the project withered on the vine for years.

The pistol is a double/single 9 x 19 with a fifteen round magazine, ambi controls, decocker, loaded chamber indicator, chrome lined barrel and night sights. Loaded, It is heavy even with the aluminum frame, and a little bulky, and anyone with smaller hands than I have would have a hard time using it comfortably. (I wear a large glove) Wiki says that they are still in service in the region in the police and military. Zastava has made a try on the American market with new (but barely changed) versions of this piece, but they are not making a splash. The perfect example of being several decades late and a dollar short.

I bought this gun, a while back. I don't exactly remember how I came by it but it would have been cheap. It is one of those pieces that has spent a long time in the "project box" meaning something that I intended to get to it sometime, hopefully in this lifetime. The time came... I remembered that it was not functioning so I started trying to figure out what was not working right. I ordered some parts from Numrich and from Wolff and got it working a lot better, but not good enough. I found a source for an original magazine for a fair price and once it came in, I had a functional firearm.

The problem, once it was working, was it was just ugly, butt ugly. The frame and the steel slide were widely pitted, especially on one side (where it probably laid in someone's salt water tackle box) So yesterday I decided to try my hand at a refinishing job. I have a little 1 x 30" belt sander from Harbor Freight, (that has been one of the best tools I ever bought for under a hundred bucks) and I begin taking off metal, little at the time until I got something close to a flat surface. I went from 600 grit down to 2000 and then went to the buffer. and the thing is looking a hundred percent better. Tomorrow I have some Ceramacoat in a rattle can coming. So I will do a little shake and bake. I am a terrible painter and it may turn out looking like a dog's butt sewed up with a grape vine, but, I am working on the theory that I can't really hurt the piece. I am only painting the slide, it will be a two-tone, polished aluminum and flat black. I would do the frame, and I might yet, but I can find no information on a full disassembly and it is a little funky to work on with no guidance.

If it comes out OK, I will show some pics tomorrow night. If it doesn't I will come back and delete this thread and no one will be the wiser. ;)

I got two guns, one's a 1911, and the other isn't. Never handled one of these commie auto's, never even knew of anyone around here that had one. Knew a guy who brought back some sort of commie auto from Vietnam but I don't remember what it was.

The project turned out OK after a couple of false starts. I learned that, if you drop the piece you are painting in the dirt, there is no recovery by wiping the dirt off and keep on spraying... The third spray, I was happy with. I tried to get some photos, but they were meaningless with my photo shooting skills. The old pistol is now working well and looking, at least, respectable.