Zastava M90


The Zastava M90 was an assault rifle developed and produced by Zastava Arms in Serbia, Yugoslavia. It was developed from the famous Zastava M70 assault rifle, the modified copy of the Soviet AKM assault rifle, but with a Western type flash eliminator added on the barrel end, chambered in also Western, 5.56×45mm NATO caliber, and with that a different magazine design, similar to Western STANAG magazine
The M90 was intended to replace the M70 in the Yugoslav army, but the breakup of Yugoslavia disrupted the production and the weapon today remains rare and was never formally used, probably due to lack of 5.56×45mm NATO ammunition.

Overview

The Zastava M90 is the modified version of Zastava M80, itself a version of the Zastava M70, also comes with a flash eliminator and different magazine design, which means that like its predecessor, the M90 is a modified Soviet AKM. It is gas-operated, air-cooled and magazine-fed, shoulder fired weapon with selective fire capability, and like M70, can launch rifle grenades and has a rifle grenade sight added on the gas tube, instead of under barrel grenade launcher like on most other AK variants. It also incorporates the adjustable gas system from its M76, M77 and B1 cousins, with the third gas position being the gas cutoff for grenades.
Like all Zastava produces AK variants, the M90 can be identified from the originals by its longer lower wooden handguard design, which has three cooling vents, no bulge and like the stock, is made out of different wood type. Also, due to using Western round, this particular model also has different magazine design, similar to Western STANAG and a Western type flash eliminator, similar to one used on American M16 assault rifle. Like on the other Zastava AK's, this three vent feature gives the M90 lower overheating when compared to the originals, but, the Western round in this case, slightly reduces reliability.

Variants