CZ 75

The CZ 75 was designed by Frantisek Koucky, working with his brother Josef, for Ceska zbrojovka Uhersky Brod, and introduced in 1975. Koucky had recently retired when the company offered him the job in 1969, and unusually he was given complete freedom to design the pistol from scratch. It was developed for export, since the Czechoslovak service cartridge was the Soviet 7.62x25mm and later the 9x18mm Makarov. Koucky's domestic patents were classified as "secret patents": nobody could learn of their existence, and neither he nor the company was permitted to file for protection abroad. The consequence was that manufacturers around the world copied the design freely. The CZ 75 is one of the original "wonder nines", was not sold inside Czechoslovakia until 1985, and was adopted by the Czech armed forces only after the Velvet Revolution. More than a million have been built, and it is the most common handgun in the Czech Republic.

The pistol is short-recoil operated with a locked breech, using the Browning linkless cam system found on the Hi-Power, where locking lugs milled into the barrel engage recesses in the roof of the slide and a cam track actuated by the slide release pin drops the barrel after a few millimetres of travel. Construction is all steel with a hammer-forged barrel and a staggered-column magazine holding 15 or 16 rounds in 9x19mm. Its most distinctive feature is that the slide rides inside the frame rails rather than outside, an arrangement shared with the SIG P210 that lowers the bore axis and contributes to the pistol's reputation for controllability. Most models have a double-action/single-action trigger with a frame-mounted manual safety, allowing cocked-and-locked carry.

Production falls into three generations. Rifles made from 1975 to 1980 - the "short rail" first model, about 20,000 guns - had forged frames and 115 mm slide rails. From 1980 the rails were lengthened to 140 mm, frames were cast (initially from Spanish blanks that cracked in testing, later from CZ's own foundry) and a half-cock notch was added. From 1993 the CZ 75 B added an internal firing pin block, and almost all subsequent models carry it.

The family is extensive. Full-size steel models include the CZ 75 B, the decocker-equipped BD, the Police variant and the Omega-trigger versions. Compacts include the CZ 75 Compact, the CZ 75 D PCR and the CZ P-01, an alloy-framed model that received NATO certification and became the standard weapon of the Czech National Police in 2002. The CZ 2075 RAMI is a subcompact for concealed carry, while the SP-01, CZ 75 TS Tactical Sports and TS Czechmate serve competition shooters. Clones and derivatives produced elsewhere include the Italian Tanfoglio pistols, the Israeli Jericho 941, the Swiss Sphinx, the Chinese NZ75 and the North Korean Baek Du San.