Repeating flintlock firearms ?

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RobSmith

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Were there ever such a thing ?

I keep reading obscure references indicating that there might have been experimental work done in that area around the end of the 18th century.

With modern "pelleted" powder, a wad or some sort to make a gas sceal, and a projectile of some description being glued together into a primitive "cartridge", I see no logical reason why one couldn't be put together ...

Just another way to mess with the regs .... :D:evil::stirthepot2:
 
I think that Brownings father may have patented one with a sliding lock and stacked charges in one barrel. I think they stood a high risk of the front charge igniting the next charge back. I also think in the percussion era there was a rifle with a magazine that slid sideways with a series of charges. I think it would have had the same problem of hot gasses spraying out sideways that a revolving rifle has.

cheers mooncoon
 
the first 'chain gun' was a flintlock. series of chambers arranged on a chain that rotated to be inline with a fixed barrel. Nice idea for a castle parapet but not alot of application to modern shooting sports. Yes there is a cool factor but that would quickly disolve in the flash from a few hundred grains of BP exploding in your hands.

Maybe just focus on hitting what you aim at the first time and save yourself the extra cleaning.
 
It's probably possible, if quite ungainly and unreliable.

Probably have to make paper cartridges fed into a sealing chamber, recoil operated that would both #### the flint and on trigger pull, puncture the cartridge to fire. Could also be short stroke piston operated if well vented. Alternatively a flash paper could be used, but you'd want a very good chamber seal and a magazine built to vent down and away from the shooter if you had a chainfire.

I'm willing to bet you could get it to work for a couple rds before fouling seized up the system.
 
Both flint and wheel-lock revolvers were built prior to Colt's introduction of the percussion-fired revolver.
 
Look up Elisha Collier on Wikepedia. He not only made revolving flintlock pistols but apparently rifles too.
Then there were the "roman candle" guns which fired superposed loads. That must have been a hoot!
 
Search for: "The Lorenzoni Principle"

hxxp://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080306093009AA1GmYM
The first magazine fed firearms predated metalic cartridges by a couple of hundred years.

Michele Lanzeroni developed a magazine fired flintlock weapon as early as the mid-1600's and was itself an improvement on the earlier Kalthoff Magazine System. Pistols made on the Lanzeroni-system pistols were made as early as the 1790's, if not earlier. (hxxp://www.artfact.com/catalog/viewLot.cfm?lotCode=VZA7WPAL ).

snip
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I saw some incredible examples at the museum of hunting and nature in Paris a couple years ago. There was even a six barreled revolving shotgun if I remember right.



The Musée de la Chasse et de la Nature is a private museum of hunting and nature located in the IIIe arrondissement at 62, rue des Archives, Paris, France. It is open daily except Mondays and holidays; an admission fee is charged.
 
RobSmith said:
Were there ever such a thing ?

I keep reading obscure references indicating that there might have been experimental work done in that area around the end of the 18th century.

With modern "pelleted" powder, a wad or some sort to make a gas sceal, and a projectile of some description being glued together into a primitive "cartridge", I see no logical reason why one couldn't be put together ...

Just another way to mess with the regs .... :D:evil::stirthepot2:
Click to expand...

How about this?

shoot-vi.gif
 
The idea came to me in a dream.... That one could take something like an Enfield or Nagant barreled action, take the guts out of the bolt since you no longer need it, and plug the firing pin hole so that your bolt head now acts as a breech plug.

Then I could picture some sort of connecting bar being slaved off of the "bolt" (think Garand oprod) that would have some pins sticking out of it at the right positions : one to pull the hammer back to #### it, a 2nd to trip some sort of lever from a container of "priming powder" (think of a contraption similar to a modern-day powder trickler/hopper that comes with reloading kits) dumping a pinch of priming powder in the pan, and a 3rd one of snap the frizzen closed. All of that on the back swing of the "bolt". The forward movement would move a "cartridge" of some description from the magazine to the chamber.

Semi auto (or even full-auto :D) might be possible, but it would need to be delayed quite a bit to ensure enough time for every last ember to burn from the pan before the mechanism dumps in a fresh priming charge (otherwise it would likely ka-boom).

I see no reason why some sort of Gatling-ish action couldn't be put together mind you, with independant pans and frizzens but a unique hammer. That way you <should> have enough time between primings to prevent the aforementioned kaboom from happening.

I have a weird mind, I know :D:cool:.

Yet the way I understand "antique" regs that would be one way to come up with a fully fonctional, new production repeating long gun that would be free of any and all licensing or registration requirements. Since the way I read "antique" regs, anything long and flint/match/wheel lock is deemed antique, period.

H Wally said:
Mmm - I misread - I thought you said semi-auto :p :p :p

A repeating flinter wouldn't be toooooo difficult.... a semi auto would be a glorious thing indeed :D
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RobSmith said:
I see no reason why some sort of Gatling-ish action couldn't be put together mind you, with independant pans and frizzens but a unique hammer. That way you <should> have enough time between primings to prevent the aforementioned kaboom from happening.
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A very interesting concept indeed... however, the sheer weight and size of such a contraption would make it very impractical for use in the field. Not to mention the danger of running around and firing a gun that had a big BP canister attached to it (for reloading purposes). One spark and you're done... kind of like running around with an unexploded cannon ball in one hand and a lit torch in the other. :pirate:

Personally, I think that the revolver is truly the ultimate design in simplicity, portability and efficiency when it comes to basic repeating firearms. Hence why they're still around today, despite all the plastic 'black guns' that are also available. It's a design that just won't go away... and with good reason!

(I love wheelguns!)

:D
 
I never said anything about it being light, reliable, practical or safe for that matter. Just a proof of concept sort of idea ... :pirate:

If one whom has a manufacturer's license (just to cover one's arse) was to come up with a working prototype and submit it to the RCMP for classification, I wonder which concept would have precedence between antique and prohibited.

I do believe that there are already some 25 and 32 caliber, as well short barreled handguns that were confirmed to be deemed antique by the RCMP, with confirmation letter so some form of precedent has been set.

One would simply have to come up with some sort of cartridge that doesn't meet the criteria of a "cartridge" under Canadian law, hence the idea of gluing the powder charge more or less directly to the projectile, without using any sort of container, basically a caseless cartridge.

Apparently some dude called Collier (I think) had come up with some sort of "self-priming" flintlock revolver in the mid to late 1700's, just before percussion was developped. I'll have to look into that since the book I was reading "The Machine Gun", includes only a vague description and no illustrations of that particular device.

I just like thinking about this kind of stuff on my down time ....

R:d:


After reading a bit more about Mr Collier, and seeing a single picture, it sounds like a hollow frizzen kind of arrangement. Not suited for the purpose I have in mind.



762mm said:
A very interesting concept indeed... however, the sheer weight and size of such a contraption would make it very impractical for use in the field. Not to mention the danger of running around and firing a gun that had a big BP canister attached to it (for reloading purposes). One spark and you're done... kind of like running around with an unexploded cannon ball in one hand and a lit torch in the other. :pirate:

Personally, I think that the revolver is truly the ultimate design in simplicity, portability and efficiency when it comes to basic repeating firearms. Hence why they're still around today, despite all the plastic 'black guns' that are also available. It's a design that just won't go away... and with good reason!

(I love wheelguns!)

:D
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