#BULGARIAN MAKAROV PISTOL REVIEW PLUS#

My IJ-70A Mak, the test gun for this review, is chambered for the. It came with two magazines and sometimes other accessories, such as a cleaning tool and a service style holster. The IJ-70 is an all steel pistol with a polished blue finish and a fully adjustable rear sight. The East German and Russian Maks are generally regarded as the best, and the Chinese as the worst. Quality and workmanship varies depending on the country of manufacture. Most of the various Communist countries produced Makarov pistols locally in their own factories. The steel magazine holds 8 cartridges and is released by a European style heel clip. The IJ-70 is a smallish service pistol, about the size of a Glock 19 in height and length, but slimmer due to its single stack magazine. The Mak has a rebounding hammer, and it is safe to carry an IJ-70 with the safety off and the hammer lowered over a chambered cartridge. It is a conventional double-action/single action semi-automatic pistol with a hammer drop safety on the left side of the slide (up for 'safe' and down for 'fire').

#BULGARIAN MAKAROV PISTOL REVIEW PLUS#

Like the PP, the Makarov pistol has a fixed barrel, a plus for accuracy. Ballistically it remained a near twin of the. 380's, and became known as the 9mm Makarov or 9x18. 364' (approximately 9.2mm) bullet in a case 1mm longer than the. The new Russian cartridge used an odd diameter. 380 ACP (9x17mm or 9mm Kurz) cartridge, since that was the most powerful round that the basic Walther PP design could accommodate. It was chambered for a Russian version of the. Russian cops and soldiers need to be able to reach the trigger while wearing heavy winter gloves. The result was the adoption of the famous Makarov pistol, which is a slightly simplified Walther PP with an enlarged trigger guard. Locked breech designs were rejected in favor of a simple blow back mechanism in order to hold down manufacturing costs. It would become the service standard for the entire Soviet Union and its satellites. The new pistol was to serve as the duty sidearm of the various branches of the military, as well as the police, the KGB, and all other government agencies. What we have here is basically a Russian copy of the famous Walther PP (Police Pistol), which was widely used all over Europe by both Police and civilians at the time the leaders of the Soviet Union decided to replace their aging Tokarev service pistol. At present the IJ-70 is not being imported into the U.S., having been discontinued in 1996 The Russian-made Baikal IJ-70 pistol is often referred to simply as the 'Makarov.' I call it 'The gun that lost the East,' since it was the service sidearm of the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War. European American Armory (EAA) of Sharpes, Florida is the exclusive importer of Baikal products at the time of this writing. This was the darkest year of the Second World War in Soviet Russia, and guns were desperately needed to fight the invading Germans. It is also the trade name of Ishevsky Mechanichesky Zavod (SUP IMZ), a large Russian arms and ammunition manufacturing plant founded in 1942 as part of the Russian National Defence Industry. 'Baikal' is the name of a large lake in Siberia.

Bulgarian makarov pistol review