Headquartered in the Russian town of Zlatoust, the ZLATMASH plant has been manufacturing firearms for decades now, and its main product for the military and Police market is the PP-91 "Kedr" 9x18mm-PM caliber sub-machine gun, currently issued to the special troops encadred in the MVD − the Russian Ministry of Interior. Given the high level of popularity that the PP-91 "Kedr" enjoys in its homeland, ZLATMASH manufactures a wide range of civilian-grade variants of the design, ranging from semi-automatic pistols and sub-carbines to traumatic bullet replicas, and even airguns − and that's what we're talking about. The "TyRex" is a 4.5mm/.177-caliber airgun; ZLATMASH chose to manufacture such a version of the "Kedr" platform as private ownership of handguns in Russia, although no longer completely prohibited as it was a few years ago, is still tightly restricted, while ownership and trade of airguns is basically deregulated. Nonetheless, given the aesthetic similarities and control configuratiobn akin to the original sub-machinegun, the "TyRex" may be profitably used for basic training purposes.
The "TyRex" airgun is manufactured following the same technical criteria used in the making of the original PP-91 "Kedr" sub-machinegun, as well as the same materials and even most of the same machineries. The ZLATMASH "TyRex" airgun is manufactured out of steel stampings and plastic, and is available in three variants: the only difference between the first two, dubbed the PPA-K and PPA-K-01, is the lack on the PPA-K of the sheet metal upfolding stock featured on the PPA-K-01; both can shoot in semi-automatic and burst mode, feed through a single-stack magazine, and are powered through a standard, commercial-grade CO² canister hosted inside the grip. The PPA-K-02 variant has been conceived for those Countries that impose restrictions on burst-firing airguns; it comes equipped with an upfolding sheet metal stock, but is capable of semi-automatic fire only. All PPA-K "TyRex" variants also feature a 3 joules max. muzzle energy, which makes them perfectly legal to purchase and possess without a license of any kind in most Countries. Sadly, the "TyRex" is not available outside of Russia and its neighboring countries; maybe this small article will raise global interest in this jolly little plinker, of which surely ZLATMASH can manufacture enough to satisfy an international market.
