The NA-2 was an early experimental prototype design of firearm designer, Gennadly Nikonov.
History[]
In 1979, Gennaldy Nikonov, a firearms designer at Izhmash, would prototype his delayed-recoil system which was present on his more famous AN-94 design. The firearm was purely designed as a hypothesis to test the system of recoil accumulation and impulse. This is present upon firing, as both the barrel and gas block roll into the main body of the weapon. The scheme of this method would allow the user to feel the energy of the recoil after shooting, thus allowing for better accuracy. Nikonov had also decided that the weapon would best fit a bullpup design, as this would allow to exchange old magazines better. Later, Nikonov would continue to experiment with this technology in his NA-4 design, which serves as an improved version of the NA-2's capabilities and overall design. Ultimately, both designs would be submitted for trials to replace the AK-74, known as Project Abakan.
Design Details[]
The firearm was designed by choice to be built as a bullpup, as the pistol grip would be brought closer to the handguard and front of the weapon to allow the user to effectively change the magazine conveniently. Overall, the firearm had fairly crude design, with most of the weapon being built out of stamped steel, with very simple iron sights. The iron sights are also emplaced upon a handle which would allow the user to carry the firearm by this handle. The design also allows for a very simple select-fire lever mechanism, and the firearm has the capabilities between semi-automatic, and fully-automatic choices. An elongated piece of steel serves as the buttplate, and later models present in the NA-4 design would have the buttplate connect to the pistol grip via a stamped-steel wire. Two designs in which incorporated the delayed recoil technology were prototyped in a bullpup configuration, with Nikonov's later NA-4 design being directly built upon the NA-2, with similar appearances adjoined with the experimental delayed recoil technology.
Ammunition[]
As for simplicity's sake, it was chosen that the firearm would best suit 5.45×39mm magazines from the AK-74, which was seeing active usage at the time of Nikonov's design. It would also benefit as smaller caliber ammunition was in higher-demand around the 1970's, thus the NA-2 would be praised for its usage of the 5.45×39mm round.