Bren 805: A Rifle for the Post-Communist Czech Army

In 2012, I was in Afghanistan and saw some of the first issued CZ 805 BRENs that were issued to Czech soldiers. I remembered thinking that they Czechs got issued some strange G36 things when we saw them from afar. Czech MPs at FOB Shank, good guys, let us shot them when we were on the range together too!

I see the Czechs are skipping straight to naming it the BREN before the British can make a copy of it

As a Czech, this makes me want to go back to our mountains and build more weapons like the Dwarves of weapon making we are.

Hope you enjoyed your stay in our country, it's an honor to have you visit!

A high point of my life was visiting Prague castle and seeing guards carrying CZ 805, Scorpions, and what looked like chrome or silver vz. 52s.

Ladislav Findorák was the head of the arms service of the Czechoslovak People's Army, who in 1989 approved CZ-2000 for service in the army, after the end of the Cold War he started his own company, where he dealt mainly with various universal constructions. The BREN was intended as a fast-changing multicabar rifle. This eventually turned out to be a dead end of development, as one advantage it has, the barrel fixed between the screws in the frame can be easily replaced when worn, and because it does not touch the body, it can be thin and will not heat up, making the weapon lighter. For a sports shooter, this can have the advantage of changing the caliber in the garage conditions, for shooting at short distances, it should not affect accuracy.

The first gen magazine actually isnt so much proprietary - its G36 compatible (what a benefit xD)

Oh man so excited to see what Ian finds at the cz factory

Basic with this rifle was pain. It's fucking heavy, and the one I got had an aversion to gun oil, and the telescopic stock couldn't lock properly. Plus the army issued sight is big,clunky and makes the bolt handle slightly more difficult to use. Another thing is the iron sights are halfway to useless with the issued sight (rip aiming in rain). And the fire selector switch is in an akward position, makes operating it uncomfortable for some. But mainly it's just fucking heavy...

I don't have any hands-on with this generation of BREN, but I remember some interesting and funny stuff from the news since I am from the Czech republic. The controversy was, that it was quite expensive (the red dot was included alongside other accessories so it was difficult to find out the price only for the rifle, in the end, it was like 3.6K USD). One way of looking at this generation of BREN is that it helped jumpstart the Uhersky Brod factory but at the expense of us, taxpayers. CZUB was able to use the money and experience for BREN 2. This brought us new jobs and the ability to produce rifles at home. The fun part was something like: The red dot is big, heavy, and power-hungry but you can throw it at the enemy. If that does not help, take the BREN by the barrel and beat the enemy to death with the sharp Picatinny rails. If the enemy still overpowers you and takes your rifle, they will damage their hand by the reciprocating charging handle.

Interesting and subtle details showing that Ian had set this rifle up for left handed shooting. Both with the cheek rest orientation and the charging handle. I wonder if we get to see him shoot some rounds in the very near future? :)

If someone thinks that Ian is "only" a "gunfreak youtuber". His visit in this company (with enormous huge tradition of designing & producing different weapon systems) - must be a sign/litmus paper, that he's in a class of its own. Nickname "Gun Jesus" didn't came out of nowhere!!! 🤣

Iam 20 year old czech and from time to time i go to a shooting range with my father to do a little competition. I once randomly found Ians videos and started to watch them. We got it in our veins hahahah

"WARNING: Pointy thing towards the enemy" Ready for US Marines.

Looking forward to the video on the BREN 2 that was made to replace this!

Czech's and looking after us lefties by making things as ambidextrous as possible. It's appreciated.

Looks like a CZ452 hanging on the wall. Great rifle.

The quality on those rifles is amazing

I hoped Ian would get some juicy info on the bit controversial trials of the rifle. Where actually (if I remember correctly) the trials were postponed for CZ to deliver guns for testing, while FN had SCAR L ready (which were supposed to be build inder licence in Czech Rep.). I think SCARS were also supposed to be cheaper. And I am Czech I do appreciate that we have our own rifle, but I hoped the selection process would be more clear. As from the quick switch to BREN 2 can be guessed SCARS were probably better ... :) I also thought that the 805 was build from the start to have the option to chose proprietary, STANAG or G36 magazines.

Just waiting for the Bren 2 video, keep them coming Ian, great job as usual.