Ian McCollum, of Forgotten Weapons fame, just did a review of a Yugo M76 designated marksman’s rife (DMR). I like the M76 and own one built for me by Two Rivers Arms so I was listening intently.
Ian’s M76 was built by Century Arms from a kit and he’s happy with it.
Two things I picked up that I didn’t know was that the odd looking muzzle brake’s ribs at the pack are actually threads for a suppressor, Huh… that’s interesting.
Those are interrupted threads at the back of the flash hider for mounting a suppressor.
Second off, I’d heard about the ATF mixup wherein they approved 2,000 M76s to be imported with the full-auto sears installed because the rifle used it as a safety and was never full-auto so it stands to reason it was never a machinegun. Well, the ATF decided later on that these rifles were indeed machineguns because they included the evil full-auto sear and mandated that all rifles had to be collected. What I didn’t realize was that they chopped up the receivers and created all the parts kits that we see today. Ahhhhh,,,, now I know.
Please note that all images were extracted from the video and are the property of their respective owner.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
In the previous video, Ian at Forgotten Weapons does his bench top review. In this one, we get to see the rifle perform at the range. Ian was at 100 yards and he’s firing PPU match 182 gr 7.62x54r ammo and the group opened up as the barrel warmed up.
Group one – relatively cool barrelGroup 2 opened up a lot – Ian did not the barrel was hotGroup 3 – disappointing. Ian wonders if the scope had problems.
The Range Video
My Conclusion
It really does come across as a Serb copy of the PSL and not worth the fortune it is selling for unless you are a true collector. Whether it was the rifle or the scope, the results are not impressive. Personally, I thought about buying one and decided to pass. when they first came out and this cements it.
Please note that all images were extracted from the video and are the property of their respective owner.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
Ian, over at Forgotten Weapons, did a review of the new Zastava M91. In the end, you do wind up with a over-sized 7.62x54r AK variant filling a designated marksman role (DMR). As always, Ian does a provides a great commentary as he looks at and then disassembles the M91.
Stamped receiver with a unique extension at the rear to accommodate the longer cartridge. Note the POSP 4×24 optic.The M91’s unique handguardSkeleton stockA quick look down in the receiver – you can see the extension is riveted in place.
Please note that all images were extracted from the video and are the property of their respective owner.
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
I think James’ M92 SBR looks pretty wicked!! That’s our handguard set on the front. It looks great James!
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
Surprisingly, Zastava has sold all of their first batch of M91 rifles. I say “surprisingly” because I thought the steep price would deter buyers. Atlantic Firearms had it listed at $3,144.99 on 7/10 and pretty much sold out the same day. I guess I should say I was alerted they were there on 7/10 and they were gone by the time I got there. [Note: This is the link to Atlantic’s listing.]
Zastava USA is posting photos of their new M70 PAP rifles and someone asked if more M91s would be coming in. They replied that there would be more in August. Click here for the thread.
I am not sure who else got the M91 besides Atlantic so there might be some others floating around. Two have popped up on Gunbroker but without photos and that always makes me suspicious. [Click here to do a search]
Sorry, but I will not be purchasing one of these rifles at this price point. I simply can’t afford it. I have the M76 (8mm Mauser), the M77 (.308) and will stick with them. I’m hoping the rumors of a FEG Dragunov being imported pan out. [Note, my M77 cost me something like $6-700 from Centerfire hence my disappointment at the price of the M91.]
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
Normally, I like the length of the Yugo M70 and M72 buttstocks. They’re shorter than many Western fixed stock designs but I’ve just grown accustomed to the length of pull (LOP). Recently, I had Two Rivers Arms build me a M76 designated marksman’s rifle (DMR) and found the stock to be a tad shorter than what I wanted to get in position behind the big Vortex Hog Hunter scope I had bought for it.
Two Rivers Arms custom built Yugo M76 rifle with a RS!Regulate scope mount and Vortex Hog Hunter scope. The UTG rings have been replaced with an American Defense mount and the cheek piece will be replaced but you can get an idea that this is a big rifle and a big optic.
I realized that to make the LOP longer, I had two options. My normal route with an AK is to install a stock adapter and either go to some form of modular stock. In the case of the M76, I really wanted to stick with the original wood. The brought be to my second option – to add a recoil pad.
There are a ton of recoil pads on the market but as far as I know, nobody makes a direct replacement recoil pad for the Yugo military rifles other than me and my pad is a copy of the original. This gives you two options also – either cut the stock and install a “grind to fit” pad that would ruin the original stock or to go with a slip on pad.
Slip on recoil pads are designed to fit a certain range of buttstock sizes based on the height and width. They may not be the best looking of options but they get the job done and don’t require any modifications to the underlying stock — plus for folks who don’t like messing with tools – they can be slid on and off usually very easily.
End of Buttstock Size for Yugo M70B1, M72B1, and M76 Rifles
They have a new Air-Tech series that adds 1″ to the LOP and is also remarkably spongy to absorb the recoil. The M76 really doesn’t have a ton of recoil so my decision was more based on the 1″ LOP.
The AirTech slip on pad comes in four sizes:
“Small” fits stocks measuring 4-1/2 x 1-1/2 inches to 4-13/16 x 1-5/8 inches
“Small/Medium” fits stocks measuring 4-5/8 x 1-9/16 inches to 5-1/8 x 1-3/4 inches
“Medium” fits stocks measuring 4-13/16 x 1-5/8 inches to 5-1/8″ x 1-3/4 inches
“Large” fits stocks measuring 5-1/8 x 1-3/4 inches to 5-3/8 x 1-7/8 inches
The small-sized pad slid right on and fits nice and snug.
I actually wish they had a pad that added about 1/2-3/4″ of pull as that would be perfect. The end result is just a tad longer than what I would dial in with an adjustable Magpul PRS stock but it definitely feels better when I start lining up behind the scope. It’s staying on the rifle!
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
This will be short post and not a very happy one from my perspective. A few days ago, I emailed Zastava USA for an update on their planned importation of the M91 rifle. They responded to me on June 4th and reported that they will have a “very limited number” some time this summer and the MSRP is $3,400. Wow. I had hoped it would be much more affordable than that – I’ll just have to stick with my M76 and M77 at that price point.
I had really hoped they would be more affordable but after my first post, a number of guys in the know said the price was going to be well over $2K depending on the options selected. Well, now I have the first hand info to pass along.
They did not respond about the M93 by the way. So, no updates on that front but given the pricing on the M91, I’m betting it will be high-priced as well.
Sorry I don’t have better news. For folks who can afford them, please post photos and your experiences so I can live vicariously.
They are here! The following are Zastava listings of weapons you can buy online and have shipped to your FFL:
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
I finally got a chance to take the Yugo M76 to the range and my youngest daughter went with me although now that she’s in college she’s gone a lot. I do have fun when she’s home as she loves shooting also and knows her way around a rifle.
Erika is getting the rifle situated. I forgot my good bench rest so we made do with a Caldwell bag rest I brought along just in case. The weather was great.
We set up at 100 yards and I did the initial test firing and sighting in of the rifle. Function-wise, it was great. We did not have a single failure to feed or eject the whole day.
By the way, my daughter is wearing MPOW 035 ear muff hearing protectors and she said they worked great. She wore them when we were shooting the M76, my .338 Lapua and 9mm Glocks. They are excellent not to mention a good deal. I have three sets of them now for her and others. I am still using my Howard Leight by Honeywell electronic ear muffs.7
Both of us were wearing NoCry safety glasses. I use ones that go over my prescription eye glasses and my daughter wears normal ones because she has contacts.
One thing the slowed me up a bit was that the laser bore sight didn’t really help me out much. I have a new one from Wheeler that works great on the actual muzzle end of rifles but it would appear the M76’s brake was not truly perpendicular to the bore. Normally it is pretty slick but at the range, I had to fire a number of rounds to even get them on the backing board first and then finally to the bullseye.
We were shooting S&B 196 grain SPCE ammo. My groups were about 1.5-2″. I’ll get back down to the range one of these days with my better rest so I can test the accuracy. I have some Hornady Vintage Match ammo too that has cool specs but since I didn’t have my bench rest with me, I largely saved it for next time and will explain why I said that in a moment.
Pierced Primers
The only problem we encountered was the firing pin piercing primers. We went through almost 40 rounds and about a third had pierced primers. This is a known issue with M76s and, yes, the rifle is headspaced properly.
At first I thought it might just be the S&B ammo so I tested it with five rounds of Hornady Vintage match also. I think two of the five Hornady rounds were pierced. At any rate, here are some photos of the S&B ammo.
Example pierced primer. It did this both on S&B and Hornady ammo.At home, I grabbed some random brass and took this photo to show both pierced and cratered primers.
There are a lot of posts about the piercing and cratering of primers with the M76. I’m pretty busy right now but will read all that I can before I do anything.
First, I plan to confirm the pin protrudes between 1.42mm (.056″) minimum and 1.52mm (.060″) maximum.
Second, I want to compare how close the firing pin hole is to the firing pin on my other M76 bolt plus some of my AKs. I don’t think it looks unusually large but it should be investigated.
Third, I have a hypothesis – I think the firing pin needs more of a rounded radius. The current face of the firing pin is relatively flat. There were literally little punched pieces of primer laying on the firing bench that were flat and the primers that intact showed a very flat impact.
Those primer pieces, maybe they should be called chads, show a pretty flat firing pin face.
I’m not going to rush into anything. I do have a second complete bolt assembly that I can look at and scavenge from if need be. If you have suggestions, contact me – in**@*********ps.com.
Bottom line
We had a lot of fun. The rifle performed very well with no feed or ejection problems, no magazine problems and only the pierced primers were minor issue.
I do need to work on the cheek rest more so it stays in place better.
I definitely look forward to shooting this rifle with a better bench rest and also comparing it side by side with my .308 M77. Also, I’ll report back on what I try to correct the firing pin piercing or cratering primers at some point in the future. Until then, have a great day!
If you find this post useful, please share the link on Facebook, with your friends, etc. Your support is much appreciated and if you have any feedback, please email me at in**@*********ps.com. Please note that for links to other websites, I may be paid via an affiliate program such as Avantlink, Impact, Amazon and eBay.
