ZH-29

The ZH-29 was a Czechoslovak semi-automatic service rifle designed by Emmanuel Holek at the Brno arms works and dating to 1929. It used a gas-operated action with a side-swinging bolt and fed 7.92x57mm Mauser cartridges from a detachable box magazine of five, ten or about twenty-five rounds, at a time when most armies still issued bolt-action rifles. The wooden-stocked rifle weighed roughly ten pounds and was about forty-five inches long, with an aluminum heat shield on the forend and a long exposed barrel. Armies that tested it in the 1930s found it long, heavy and awkward to fit with a bayonet, so it found few buyers, although it proved accurate and robust. Besides Czechoslovakia, later users included Ethiopia, Taiwan and Thailand, and the rifle also served under German control after the occupation.