I’m always fascinated when a gun has a hallmark from a country that no longer exists. I adore a West German P220, and now I have a gun marked West Germany that was made in Hungary. That gun is the AP66, a clone of the Walther PP. FEG made the AP66, but a West German reseller called Hege Weffen, a West German company owned by a man named Georg Hebsacker, sold the gun.
These little handguns were a fairly common import to the United States for years, but seem to have dried up. With that in mind, the markings varied. West Germany dates the gun, so does the Hege Weffen name. These were imported with simpler markings, including Made In Hungary FEG-Budapest, which tends to be fairly common.
The AP66 series came in .22LR, .32 ACP, and .380 ACP. As the resident One True Caliber enthusiast, I have the .32 ACP version. There are various models, including guns imported with adjustable sights, various finishes, and grip panels. There are also a few different-sized guns that are still just called the APP66. Hungary has a long history of producing similar pistols.
FEG started producing Walther clones in the 1940s. The FEG PA-63 was a Walther PP clone in 9mm Makarov that served as the Hungarian service pistol. In 2000, they even received a license from Walther to produce the .22LR Walther PPK/E.
The AP66 – The PP Clone
The AP66 is, for all intents and purposes, a Walther PP clone. I know this will sound odd, but I don’t have a PP, but I have an arsenal of PP-related jokes. The AP66 gives us the Walther PP system. It’s a direct blowback-operated, semi-automatic, DA/SA handgun fed from a single-stack seven-round magazine.
The barrel is fixed and acts as the recoil guide rod. The AP66 features a left-side safety that also acts as a decocker. This AP66 is a two-tone model with a shiny-finish frame and black slide, a fairly common theme with Hungarian pistols. The original PA-63 used the same two-tone design.
A shiny military pistol doesn’t make much sense, but this reflective polish finish was cheap, and that’s why it became a favorite of FEG guns. At its core, the FEG AP66 is just a .32 ACP PA-63. While these guns are essentially Walther clones, there are some notable differences.
The magazines are not interchangeable, for example. The latch cuts are in different places, and many Walthers have a slight tab on the left side of the magazine to hold the slide open when the last round is fired.
The AP66 has a passive firing pin safety and a hammer drop safety. With the AP66, the hammer sits above the firing pin when the hammer is down. As you pull the trigger or manually cock the hammer, the firing pin raises to align with the hammer. The PP has a passive hammer block, and the AP66 does not. The hammer profile is different between the two guns as well.
Shooting the AP66
The AP66 in .32 ACP handles like a dream. I hate shooting Walthers or Walther clones in .380 ACP or 9mm Makarov. They tend to be painful and uncomfortable to shoot due to the thin frames, direct blowback design, and slide bite. That’s not true with the .32 ACP variants.
There is an apparent reason why James Bond originally went with the .32 ACP. It’s delightful to shoot. Recoil is next to nil, and the gun barely moves in your hand. The little .32 ACP round is the best mouse gun round for low recoil and decent performance. It makes shooting the little gun tons of fun.
People who claim you won’t see your sights in a gunfight must have shot a lot of guns like the AP66. I can barely see the sights at the square range. The dinky little front sight mixed with the tiny rear sight makes it tough to find your sights quickly. Doing any form of transition drill is a bit of a challenge.
When you find the sights and get them properly aligned, you have a surprisingly accurate gun. At 25 yards, it’s easy to put a magazine’s worth of ammo into a six-inch group. The AP66 can put those little .32 ACP pills where you want…once you find the sights.
But the Trigger
That level of accuracy assumes you are using the single-action trigger. Trying to use the double-action trigger is a trip. If you want to build grip strength, pull the AP66’s double-action trigger. It’s incredibly heavy, and the pull is weighed in double digits. I would weigh it, but it maxes out my trigger scale. It’s so heavy that Alec Baldwin couldn’t make it ND.
The AP66’s single-action trigger is a little heavy, at least for a single-action trigger, but it’s fine. The Eastern Europeans seem to be largely against the idea of nice triggers. They also seem to be against the existence of left-handed shooters.
The left grip panel features an aggressive thumb rest. It’s fine for right-handed shooters but would be uncomfortable for lefties. A lot of the controls are Walther-like. We have a push-button magazine release, but the magazine does not drop free. It pulls a Hi-Power, and the magazine just barely moves and has to be stripped for a proper reload.
The slide-mounted safety also decocks the gun. It’s easy enough to reach and access with a firing grip. There is no slide release, but the slide does lock to the rear on an empty magazine. If you’ve shot a Walther, you know what to expect. The AP66 replicates the PP ergonomics to a T.
An Affordable Option
The AP66 series isn’t all that popular these days. You won’t find them in the back of Shotgun News for $199 anymore.
Still, they tend to be quite affordable. The design was never super popular, and Eastern European guns rarely become collectible.
The AP66 could be a viable carry gun, and if you can pick one up for 150 dollars or so, it’s a solid deal and a good shooter.
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