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Information wanted on Echasa and its FAST pistol

9K views 12 replies 6 participants last post by  Director101 
#1 ·
Hi --

Can someone point me to reliable information or sources on the Eibar firearms maker Echasa (Echave y Arizmendi) in the post-WWII period? I keep running into conflicting information.

I am especially interested in knowing when production of the FAST pistol began and ended (I believe it ended in 1969 after importation into the US was effectively ended by the new firearms regulations, which is also when I believe Echasa went out of business), and if the FAST was always an aluminum alloy frame pistol, or if it originally had a steel frame.

I have seen production start dates for the FAST ranging from the late 1940s to the late 1950s, along with statements that Echasa did not even resume making firearms until the 1950s.

Thanks,

Bill
 
#5 · (Edited)
Thanks, Mark. Ed Buffaloe's Unblinking Eye is a wonderful source!

Disclosure: I sometimes contribute to Ed's articles on MAB pistols, and the ultimate goal in this case is to update and correct some of the MAB articles on Unblinking Eye. There is very little information available about MAB, and apparently even less about Echasa. I'm trying to get a better idea of what Echasa was doing when, in order to better understand the relationship between (a French Basque company) and Echasa (a Spanish Basque company located maybe 50 miles away), and particularly the relationship between the Echasa model FAST and the MAB model GZ. MAB made an all-steel pistol (the model G), then replaced it with an aluminum alloy framed version (the model GZ) made in France; MAB discontinued the GZ after a few years. During this same period Echasa started making the GZ (as the "Echasa Modelo GZ - MAB Espanola"), but the GZ is identical to the FAST. I'm trying to figure out if MAB and Echasa collaborated on the design of the GZ & FAST, or if one licensed the design from the other, since it appears Echasa may have been making the FAST in Spain at the same time MAB was making the GZ in France, as well as Echasa making both the GZ and the FAST after MAB stopped producing the GZ.

There seems to be a lot of overlap between the French and Spanish Basque arms makers, both as businesses and as families.

Bill
 
#6 ·
Montelongo,

Thank you for these dates. Do you have much information about the "aluminum alloy frame pistol" Echasa began making in 1959? Was it the model FAST? As I described in another posting, the Echasa model FAST is identical to the MAB model GZ, which is an aluminum alloy framed version of the all-steel MAB model G. It appears Echasa began making the FAST at the same time MAB was making the GZ; after MAB ceased production of the GZ Echasa was producing both the FAST and the "Echasa Modelo GZ - MAB Espanola" (as well as the EA Basque, Dickson Special Agent, and other names, but all the same pistol, and all apparently sharing the same serial number series).

Bill

Hello:

The production of "Echave and Arizmendi":

1914 - 1936 production steel weapons.

1939 - 1958 production bicycles.

1959 - 1969 production aluminum alloy frame pistol

Greetings
 
#9 ·
Thank you, Montelongo.

I am not quite sure what you mean by "a punctual collaboration" -- could you explain this? (I know you are using translation software, and I think it became confused when it translated the Spanish word you used as "punctual".)

By the way, do you know anything about the Eibar pistol maker Gregorio Bolumburu, who made (among other pistols) the "Rex"?

Thanks,

Bill

Hello:

D "Manufacture d´ Armes de Bayonne" (MAB) was founded in 1921.

In the years 50 "Echave and Arizmendi" collaborate with MAB manufacturing in Spain the model "GZ."

I believe that it was a punctual collaboration, but I don't have more data.

Greetings.
 
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