IZh-58

The IZh-58 (ИЖ-58) is a Soviet double-barreled shotgun.

History
IZh-58 was designed by L. I. Pugachev (Л. И. Пугачев), in last months of 1958 first shotguns were made.

Since 1961, a new varnish with improved characteristics has been used to protect the wooden parts of the gun. As a result, since January 1961, the price of one standard IZh-58 was 60 roubles.

More than 1.36 million IZh-58 hunting shotguns were produced in all four standard variants. In addition, one experimental sample of lightweight IZh-58 shotgun was made with aluminium alloy details.

It was replaced by IZh-43 model in late 1980s. The last IZh-58MAE shotgun was made in 1987.

Design
IZh-58 is a side by side smoothbore shotgun. The detachable barrels are made from heat-treated 50RA steel (сталь 50PA)

The barrels have chokes at the muzzle end.

It has a walnut, birch or beech shoulder stock and fore-end

Variants

 * IZh-58 (ИЖ-58) - first model In total, 642,000 IZh-58 shotguns were made in 1958-1971 and 73 thousands of them were sold to other countries
 * IZh-58M (ИЖ-58М) - second model, since 1970 In total, 235,000 IZh-58M shotguns were made in 1970-1976 and 115 thousands of them were sold to other countries
 * IZh-58MA (ИЖ-58МА) - third model, since 1975. It is equipped with new safety mechanism
 * IZh-58MAE (ИЖ-58МАЕ) - last model, since 1977. It is equipped with new safety mechanism and ejector
 * IZh-58MA-20M (ИЖ-58MA-20М) - export variant (IZh-58MA with 670-680mm barrels chambered in 20/76 mm Magnum shotgun shells)

Users

 * USSR
 * 🇧🇾 Belarus - is allowed as civilian hunting weapon
 * 🇧🇬 Bulgaria
 * Russian Federation - is allowed as civilian hunting weapon
 * 🇺🇸 USA - the import was allowed