I spent most of my elementary and high school years growing up in Prague, Czech Republic. I remember spending a lot of time staring in the windows of the Ceska Zbrojovka store downtown, although back then I was mostly looking at the Swiss Army knives, since I wasn’t old enough to buy guns. When I moved back stateside and turned 21, some buddies got me into guns, and I slowly began accumulating what has turned into a small collection. That collection has been lacking a CZ.

I’ve always wanted a CZ, but for a number of reasons (tales of crappy triggers, the need to fill more practical voids in my collection, and a general lack of availability in my area) it just never happened. A number of months back I was at the range and the guy next to me was shooting a P-01. He let me put a few rounds through it, and I was pretty impressed. I started casually looking, but missed out on the Buds surplus batch for $279 a couple of months back. I tried to bid on a few from CDI sales on gunbroker, but the auctions kept climbing higher than I was willing to pay. Last week I saw that Buds had a few more in stock, although at a higher price. There were no pictures, so I had no real idea of what I was getting, but I decided to roll the dice and dropped the hammer on a “good” rated 75 Compact for $399.

I figured I’d do a writeup for anyone out there that’s considering one of these, but who, like me, might be a bit afraid of buying sight unseen. Obviously, I can only speak for the gun I received and YMMV, but hopefully I can provide a bit of a baseline.

What I Got
I picked my gun up at the FFL yesterday, and to say I am happy with what I received would be a massive understatement. It’s a 1999 CZ 75 D Compact, with a steel frame and slide, and a decocker. I wasn’t even aware that they made these (all of the current production decocker models are alloy framed), but I’m pretty stoked that this is what I got. The gun does have a squared-off trigger guard and a firing pin block. The serial numbers on the frame, slide, and barrel all match.





Fit and Finish
I feel like “Good” is a reasonable description of the finish, especially considering this is a used surplus gun. It looks like it may have been refinished at some point (albeit poorly), as there are a few deep scratches that have some kind of finish over them, and the roll marks are filled in a bit. There are also a few scratches though the finish here and there, and a tiny bit of rust on the mag release button, but nothing overly concerning. The barrel has the CZ version of Sig Smilies on it, indicating that it’s been shot some, but the muzzle crown is unmarred and the bore is perfect. The rails show machine marks and minimal finish wear, and slide to frame fit is good. With a good cleaning and lube, the slide action smoothed up nicely.









Magazine
The gun came with one 14-round mag which shows some wear and had some surface rust on it. 5 minutes with some steel wool, the rust is gone, and appears to have left behind no pitting. The metal mag baseplate is kinda weird how it sticks out beyond the front of the grip. I may grind it down, or try out some of the rubber baseplates that Greg Cote has for sale on his site.

The gun does have a magazine brake (I have already ordered the part to replace it from CZ….$10 is a small price to pay for drop-free magazines), but the mag doesn’t require an inordinate amount of force to insert or extract as some have reported with these surplus guns...it slides in and out freely.


Trigger
The trigger is heavy in DA, and has a good amount of takeup. The takeup, however, is consistent and not “sloppy”, and it’s easy to stage. The single action is surprisingly hgood. You can feel the firing pin block mechanism disengaging, but the pull is consistent and breaks cleanly. Overtravel is very slight. The reset is a bit longer than I’m used to, but it’s hard to beat a Sig SRT.

Function/Reliability
I shot about 150 rounds of various loads (124gr Sig Vcrown, 124Gr Gold Dots, 115gr ball, and 124gr Missouri LRN Coated). All but the coated bullets functioned perfectly, even the powderpuff 115gr handloads. The coated 124gr Missouri bullets jammed the gun up tight. The rounds wouldn’t chamber all the way, and would not allow the gun to return to battery. I had to place the rear sight against the bench and apply strong downward force to get the slide to cycle and extract the round. From looking at the round, the bullet is contacting the rifling well forward of the case neck, and it’s almost a full ¼” from properly chambering on a plunk test. This load chambers fine in all of my other 9mms (A Glock, a Beretta 92, a Sig P6, and even the match-grade chamber of my Springfield EMP), so the CZ must be pretty tight.

Accuracy
This is where this old gun really blew me away. The grip on this thing just works for me. Even with the heavy trigger, I was able to consistently draw and fire doubletaps with a one inch spread from 7 yards. The group below is 10 rounds fired unsupported from 7 yards at a moderate rate of fire (1st round DA, followup shots SA). Not bad for a beat up surplus pistol!

Great gun, and great shooting. Congrats!
Yes, not too many know about this particular model. Love it. Thanks for excellent the write-up.

I read the email from Bud's; I considered getting one briefly but when it comes down to it there's zero need for me to have one. When it comes to smaller 9mm pistols the temptation mantra about "it's never about need..." doesn't work with me. It's not one I'd ever choose to carry, so full size CZs will have to continue to float my boat as they already have. I saw the 75B and 75 in the email as well; my credit card is glad that I already have the 75B in several flavors.

quote:

Originally posted by soggy_spinout:
I read the email from Bud's; I considered getting one briefly but when it comes down to it there's zero need for me to have one. When it comes to smaller 9mm pistols the temptation mantra about "it's never about need..." doesn't work with me. It's not one I'd ever choose to carry, so full size CZs will have to continue to float my boat as they already have. I saw the 75B and 75 in the email as well; my credit card is glad that I already have the 75B in several flavors.

I hear ya, and it is likely not going to be a carry gun for me, either. I know that the longer barrel of a full size will give slightly better ballistic performance and increased sight radius...but they've always just felt front heavy to me. For this reason every handgun I own is a compact...with the exception of my 92FS. That's why I was so excited that it came with a steel frame...it adds weight, but puts it right where I want it.

I have the alloy version, so it would be interesting if you had the chance to compare the two (or even an approximation with your friend's PO-1).

Any indication where this came from -- i.e., what country/organization? Some speculation in the Q&A section on Bud's site that they're Israeli.

quote:

Originally posted by Holger Danske:
I have the alloy version, so it would be interesting if you had the chance to compare the two (or even an approximation with your friend's PO-1).

Any indication where this came from -- i.e., what country/organization? Some speculation in the Q&A section on Bud's site that they're Israeli.

Unfortunately, the guy who let me shoot his P-01 was just some guy at the range...I don't know him. There are some folks at my gun club who are big CZ aficionados, though...maybe I can talk then into letting me try one of theirs one of these days.

As to the origin of these guns...there's nothing I can see on mine to clearly indicate where it came from. There was a semi-compact on gunbroker from CDI Sales that I was looking at that had a Menorah and "Masada" marked on the slide (it ended up going for more than what a new CZ75 goes for). Apart from the timeframe that these are showing up on the market, and the fact that both bear the Interarms import mark, there's not really anything to indicate that they are from the same source. I'd say it's a good bet that mine is Israeli origin, but there's no way that I can see to prove it.

I had never shot or seen a 75 Compact until a few weeks ago, when a friend of mine bought a new one and brought it with him when visiting. I have a 75B and a 97, so the Compact felt very comfortable. I checked the zero at 25 yards and then, after only 5 rounds, decided to shoot a bullseye target, timed fire, standing, single hand. I believe it was a 91 score target, which is better than I have done with any stock factory firearm straight out of the box, with a rough creepy service gun single action trigger. I loved the weight and the feel of the cut down 75. And all the CGW 75 parts will fit it!

Joe

Im glad it worked out for you! I've been thinking of getting one too, not a bad price!

The size and shape of the magazine base plate seems to be characteristic of CZ. I own a CZ-83, and the front of the magazine base plate looks the same.

Great report and terrific shooting.

quote:

Originally posted by Daniel71:
The size and shape of the magazine base plate seems to be characteristic of CZ. I own a CZ-83, and the front of the magazine base plate looks the same.

Yeah, I'm not sure why they do that...maybe to provide a base to keep your entire hand on the grip? While it hasn't pinched me yet, I can definitely see it happening. It doesn't ruin the gun for me...It's just kinda odd, and not really what I'm used to.

quote:

Originally posted by 92fstech:

quote:

Originally posted by Daniel71:
The size and shape of the magazine base plate seems to be characteristic of CZ. I own a CZ-83, and the front of the magazine base plate looks the same.

Yeah, I'm not sure why they do that...maybe to provide a base to keep your entire hand on the grip? While it hasn't pinched me yet, I can definitely see it happening. It doesn't ruin the gun for me...It's just kinda odd, and not really what I'm used to.

With the magazines that came with my PCR in '09, the baseplate was turned down at the front, which I find very helpful (isn't really clear in the photo, but maybe you can get the gist) -- the straight, protruding baseplate of the SIG P6 I had always bugged me.

quote:

Originally posted by Holger Danske:

With the magazines that came with my PCR in '09, the baseplate was turned down at the front, which I find very helpful (isn't really clear in the photo, but maybe you can get the gist) -- the straight, protruding baseplate of the SIG P6 I had always bugged me.

You know, I hadn't thought about it, but I went and looked at my P6, and you are absolutely correct...the mag baseplates do stick out to the front of the grip. The way the P6 grip fits my hand, though, my fingers don't get down that far, so I guess I just never thought about it. Like I said...not a huge deal...just different from what I'm used to.

quote:

Originally posted by Daniel71:
The size and shape of the magazine base plate seems to be characteristic of CZ. I own a CZ-83, and the front of the magazine base plate looks the same.

I always assumed they did it for the same reason they have the magazine brake and why the heel magazine release held on as long as it did in Euro designs. Europeans have a different mindset about magazines. European shooters tend to be trained to remove the expended magazine and retain it. The extended lip on the front of the magazine gives something to hold onto while extracting the empty mag. Again, that's just an assumption and could be totally off base.