CZ-52

From GunCounter

Range Report: CZ-52

Review reposted from the old site

By Netpackrat

Tue, Dec 11, 2007 6:56 pm

I originally posted this to The Other Side Forum on May 3, 2006:

I finally picked up my “new” CZ-52 Czech Canceler today. This was supposed to be my BAG day gun, but it was late due to the company I bought it from not getting the shipment in from their supplier when they expected it. Oddly enough, I called them yesterday morning and was told they still hadn’t gotten them yet. Then, a few hours later, I got an email from my FFL telling me it had arrived. Go figure. Since I have Monday and Tuesday off, I drove right out to get it this afternoon.

Anyway, it’s just your basic CZ-52 surplus pistol in 7.62x25mm Tokarev. The slide and barrel match, but the frame looks to have been “force matched” at some point at the arsenal (i.e. they stamped new numbers in the frame). Frame is marked as having been built in ‘53, and all parts are blued. Grips are the standard ugly plastic military grip panels. The pistol included a cheezy military flap holster, cleaning rod, and 2 magazines.I purchased an additional 2 magazines (aftermarket) since I didn’t know what the pistol was going to include.

Since the range at which I have a membership is on the way home from the FFL’s house, I stopped to try it out. The only ammo I have found for it locally (so far) is some corrosive surplus FMJ, which came packaged in 70 round boxes, of which I bought 3. Plainly put, this ammo sucks. About 1 in 5 rounds failed to fire with the first hammer strike. Those that I hit a second time fired, but mostly I just cleared them and didn’t bother to pick them up. Some of the empty casings that I picked up exhibited split necks. I have to find a source of better ammo for this thing, but that might be a pain since the mail order houses won’t ship to Alaska.

Overall I am pleased with the pistol itself. I had one failure to eject, and I am blaming that on the ammo along with the failures to fire. The magazines I am not real impressed with, both the original and aftermarket. The originals are easier to load and remove due to a slightly longer floorplate, but the heel mag release sucks either way. It isn’t anywhere close to working as well as the heel release on my Sig P230, but then again that was a $500 pistol, 11 years ago. One of the original mags wouldn’t reliably operate the slide hold open device on an empty mag.

The sights are small but otherwise not bad, and the pistol fit well in my hands (I have large hands). The safety is small but easy to switch off, but I generally don’t have problems with any safety (see above). I did need to use my weak hand to engage the safety, however. The safety is also a decocker when moved up beyond the safe position, which seems kind of silly since this is a single action semiauto. There are reports of CZ-52s with worn firing mechanisms that will fire when the decocker is used. It should also be noted that this pistol should not be dry fired due to a weak firing pin which can break. Aftermarket pins are available which eliminate this problem

The trigger is kind of heavy; about what I expected for a pistol of this type. Supposedly one of the firing pin conversions improves the trigger and I may investigate this at some later point. My gut reaction, is that this pistol has the potential to be a real tack driver. I’m not the best shot in the world, but when I did my part, and the ammo went bang, the rounds went into the center of the target. I was only shooting at 10 yards though. Anyway, I gotta go clean this thing due to the corrosive ammo. I’m attaching a picture to this message; the mags on the left are the original CZ mags, and the others are aftermarket.

Skipping a bunch of replies that were mostly centered about the difficulties I had obtaining decent ammo in 7.62x25, this is the update I posted to the thread on July 26, 2006:

Finally got to the range with the acquired WWB 7.62 Tokarev ammo today. Put 100 rounds through the pistol, and every one of them fed perfectly and went bang like they were supposed to. So the problem was, as I suspected, caused by the surplus submachinegun ammo I was using. Now to find a cheaper source for the Winchester ammo. Neat pistol but I probably won’t shoot it a lot until that happens.

It wasn’t an issue with the berdan primed surplus stuff, but in trying to recover my brass I noticed that the CZ really flings the spent casings. A bunch of them had badly dented case necks, which sort of puzzled me until I realized that they were bouncing off the ceiling inside the covered firing position. I think most of them can be straightened if and when I start handloading for this caliber.

The current status of this pistol, is that I have ordered a barrel and parts to convert it to 9mm Parabellum, for better ammunition availability. I will post another range review when I get it together and am able to test it.