The Malyuk (Ukrainian: Малюк, "Baby, Buddy"), also known as the Vulkan or Vulkan-M, is a Ukrainian bullpup assault rifle.
It was designed to replace Soviet AK-pattern weapons in use by the Ukrainian army. It also serves as an alternative to the Ukrainian licensed IMI Tavor TAR-21 clone, the Fort-221, as the Malyuk is entirely domestically designed and manufactured.
History[]
The Malyuk was developed in 2005[1] as an improvement on the Vepr bullpup rifle. The project was funded by a private company, InterProInvest, and the prototypes were designed by the Ukrainian Space Agency. The first prototypes were exhibited in 2008, and in 2012 the design was finalized. Production was announced to have began in 2015-2016. It is said to have completed Ukrainian army trials in 2016, and it is now believed to be in limited use by the Ukrainian military.[2]
Design[]
The Malyuk is essentially a bullpup AK with a polymer encasing, which makes it an evolution of Ukraine's previous Vepr assault rifle design. At the heart of the Malyuk is an AKM or AK-74 receiver, with their original barrel, bolt group, and trigger group. The trigger is linked to the trigger group by a link.
The rifle ejects to the right only. A new charging handle with ambidextrous options replaces the original AK charging handle. The charging handle is said to be non-reciprocating.
The selector is a standard AK-styled selector, but only has semi-auto and full-auto positions. The safety is instead a cross-bolt button above the trigger guard, locking the trigger when engaged.
A new magazine shaft (in contrast to the original AK's lack of a magazine well) and a new locking system was added. The magazine release is a small trigger located behind the firing trigger, which releases the magazine when pulled, allowing the magazine to slide out from the magazine shaft.[3][4][5][6][7]
Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2015/10/01/malyuk-bullpup-out-of-the-ukraine/
- ↑ http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2016/11/17/ukraine-adopts-malyuk-bullpup-rifle/
- ↑ https://issuu.com/ukrainian_defense_review/docs/udr-02-2015_issue__1_/48
- ↑ https://issuu.com/ukrainian_defense_review/docs/udr-01-2016./40
- ↑ https://issuu.com/ukrainian_defense_review/docs/udr-02-2017/36
- ↑ https://issuu.com/ukrainian_defense_review/docs/udr-01-2018_engl_small__1_/44
- ↑ https://modernfirearms.net/en/assault-rifles/malyuk/
External links[]
- https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:%C2%AB%D0%9C%D0%B0%D0%BB%D1%8E%D0%BA%C2%BB_%D0%9F%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B5%D0%B7%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%8F%D0%B4%D0%BA%D0%B0.ogv
- https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Malyuk_assault_rifles.jpg
- https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Malyuk_rifle_01.jpg
- http://interproinvest.com/products/automatic-rifle-vulcano/