Spencer5883
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I came across this in a shop a few days ago. I was wondering if anyone had any information or expirence with it. It seemed like a sig but half the price. Does that also mean half the performance?
Zastava EZ .45
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Kilted Cossack
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Prepare for blathering and bloviation. I know "just enough" for it to be dangerous.
This is a .45 ACP version (which I hadn't known was offered) of a gun that has been floating around for a while now. I believe it was designed . . . somewhere in the former Yugoslavia? . . . as a straight up CAD/CAM program, allowing "plug and play" with most modern CNC machinery. Several versions have been manufactured---including, I think, South African and Israeli. The rail has been added, and I think a version or two had offered a "low round count" thing that poked you in the hand when you had three rounds left in the magazine.
I believe that it is a very close derivative of the SIG-Sauer P22x series of pistols, with the ambidextrous decocker being influenced by the Walther P88.
If you take away all the "I think" and "I've read" and "Rumor has it" that I put in this post, you get the answer: Dang, I don't know.
I think it's pretty neat, and would like the chance to wring one out.
This is a .45 ACP version (which I hadn't known was offered) of a gun that has been floating around for a while now. I believe it was designed . . . somewhere in the former Yugoslavia? . . . as a straight up CAD/CAM program, allowing "plug and play" with most modern CNC machinery. Several versions have been manufactured---including, I think, South African and Israeli. The rail has been added, and I think a version or two had offered a "low round count" thing that poked you in the hand when you had three rounds left in the magazine.
I believe that it is a very close derivative of the SIG-Sauer P22x series of pistols, with the ambidextrous decocker being influenced by the Walther P88.
If you take away all the "I think" and "I've read" and "Rumor has it" that I put in this post, you get the answer: Dang, I don't know.
I think it's pretty neat, and would like the chance to wring one out.
wristtwister
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I have no experience with the .45 version of the Zastava, but the 9mm I bought sucked pond water. I've got 10 hours of rail polishing time in... grinding down "bumps" in the slide machining, and smoothing out machinery work on parts that looked like it was done with a hammer and chisel.
If I didn't learn anything else about Zastavas, it's to take them apart before you buy one and look at the machine work INSIDE the gun. The 9mm that I bought looks great on the outside, but it's total junk on the inside. I consider it a $265 paperweight, and would feel guilty selling it to anybody.
I make it plain that I might have bought the only one that was made on a monday morning or friday afternoon, but I've got a lot of gunsmithing time in on mine, and still can't get it to run smoothly... plus, it shoots all over the place. I can shoot that gun and it sprays all over the target... take my other 9's and blow out the X-ring.
Some of it could be ammo, but I've run half a dozen different loads through it, and haven't found one yet that wanted to go straight or didn't find a way to FTF. I wouldn't carry mine as a personal protection weapon unless I knew I could push it against the target and pull the trigger... and that's iffy...
They've had several people who have posted target pictures and narratives here that swear by the Zastava. To me, Zastava is how you spell "junk" in Serbian.
WT
If I didn't learn anything else about Zastavas, it's to take them apart before you buy one and look at the machine work INSIDE the gun. The 9mm that I bought looks great on the outside, but it's total junk on the inside. I consider it a $265 paperweight, and would feel guilty selling it to anybody.
I make it plain that I might have bought the only one that was made on a monday morning or friday afternoon, but I've got a lot of gunsmithing time in on mine, and still can't get it to run smoothly... plus, it shoots all over the place. I can shoot that gun and it sprays all over the target... take my other 9's and blow out the X-ring.
Some of it could be ammo, but I've run half a dozen different loads through it, and haven't found one yet that wanted to go straight or didn't find a way to FTF. I wouldn't carry mine as a personal protection weapon unless I knew I could push it against the target and pull the trigger... and that's iffy...
They've had several people who have posted target pictures and narratives here that swear by the Zastava. To me, Zastava is how you spell "junk" in Serbian.
WT
Spencer5883
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Hey thanks for the info.
Don357
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Cossack, you hit it dead on the head. I have one of the South African 9mm made by a company called Tressitu Zastava( now defunct) for their military. I find it to be an excellent pistol and despite what some unlearned individuals "think", overall, Zastava guns are quite good and highly accurate. They were distributed by Charles Daly and now by EAA.The Israelies built a .40S&W version called a "Golan", for their military. Some of the South African TZ99's have been available from Florida Gun Works. Check out www.CZ999.org for more info on these pistols. As for the .45's, all I can say is "I WANT ONE!!!!!"
wristtwister
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Just my luck... I got the brown one...
WT
WT
the ez9 has the same overall measurements as the sig 229-regardless of whatever EAA's material might say. It is completely ambidexterous with a mag release that pushes both ways and a right side decock lever that also works as a slide stop. this one worked very well and was was well finished inside and out.. It's the only one I've examined.
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Spencer5883
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Do any of you know or predict that parts or magazines may dry up and be impossible to find in the future?
Can it take any Sig parts. Im interested in this gun but not if parts are not available due to importation bans or what not. Thanks for the help.
Can it take any Sig parts. Im interested in this gun but not if parts are not available due to importation bans or what not. Thanks for the help.
Unpredictable in the real long run I guess but you can find magazines listed on the EAA site. They also claim they will stock a full supply of spare parts.
Numrich gunparts often gets spare parts for imports and/or buys up the remainders when factories or importers drop them.
Numrich gunparts often gets spare parts for imports and/or buys up the remainders when factories or importers drop them.
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I can't comment on the .45 version, but I have a Crevna Zastava CZ99 that I bought new in the early 1990s. It has been pretty unreliable compared to any other service pistol I've owned.
Due to it's spotty reliability and utter lack of parts, I wouldn't buy another.
Allan
Due to it's spotty reliability and utter lack of parts, I wouldn't buy another.
Allan
Hoffy
Member
If a firing pin, magazine follower, safety, etc. breaks; will you be able to buy another one, even at premium prices?
If it were my money, I would need to get a "yes" to that question before I undertook further evaluation of the pistol itself.
But that's just me...
If it were my money, I would need to get a "yes" to that question before I undertook further evaluation of the pistol itself.
But that's just me...
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