{"id":29878,"date":"2026-07-06T07:32:39","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T12:32:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/06\/russian-current-service-pistol-the-pya-mp443-grach-mp446c-viking\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T07:32:39","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T12:32:39","slug":"russian-current-service-pistol-the-pya-mp443-grach-mp446c-viking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/06\/russian-current-service-pistol-the-pya-mp443-grach-mp446c-viking\/","title":{"rendered":"Russian Current Service Pistol: the PYa \/ MP443 Grach \/ MP446C Viking"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mejs-video-container\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" allow=\"autoplay\" width=\"580\" height=\"380\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/6PRNTvdkwQ4?controls=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>The current Russian service pistol is the PYa, or MP-443 &#8220;Grach&#8221;, and it is (or was) made for civilian sales as the Baikal MP-446C &#8220;Viking&#8221;. The gun was adopted by the Russian Federation to replace the PM Makarov in 2003, although it took many years to actually get into production and widespread issue.<\/p>\n<p>Mechanically, this is a pretty basic and unexciting pistol &#8211; although military pistols really should not be exciting pieces. A standard service sidearm really just needs to function reliably, and the PYa design appears to do that just fine. In military service it&#8217;s chambered for a high-pressure 7N21 9x19mm cartridge, while the civilian version here has a lighter barrel and slide and it only rated for standard 9&#215;19 Parabellum.<\/p>\n<p>Many thanks to the Royal Armouries for allowing me to film and disassemble this pistol for you! The NFC collection there &#8211; perhaps the best military small arms collection in Western Europe &#8211; is available by appointment to researchers:<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/royalarmouries.org\/research\/national-firearms-centre\/\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/royalarmouries.org\/research\/national-firearms-centre\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>You can browse the various Armouries collections online here:<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/royalarmouries.org\/collection\/\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/royalarmouries.org\/collection\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The best firearms reference books: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.headstamppublishing.com\" target=\"_blank\">https:\/\/www.headstamppublishing.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.patreon.com\/ForgottenWeapons\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/www.patreon.com\/ForgottenWeapons<\/a><br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.floatplane.com\/channel\/ForgottenWeapons\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/www.floatplane.com\/channel\/ForgottenWeapons<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Cool Forgotten Weapons merch! <a href=\"http:\/\/shop.forgottenweapons.com\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/shop.forgottenweapons.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The current Russian service pistol is the PYa, or MP-443 &#8220;Grach&#8221;, and it is (or was) made for civilian sales as the Baikal MP-446C &#8220;Viking&#8221;. The gun was adopted by the Russian Federation to replace the PM Makarov in 2003, although it took many years to actually get into production and widespread issue. Mechanically, this&hellip;&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/06\/russian-current-service-pistol-the-pya-mp443-grach-mp446c-viking\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">Read More &raquo;<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Russian Current Service Pistol: the PYa \/ MP443 Grach \/ MP446C Viking<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":29879,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[89,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-content","category-video"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29878","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29878\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/surplused.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}