rough cost estimates for ground-up design and prototyping of a new revolver.

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electricjesus

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Myself and my business partners are potentially interested in bringing a new firearm to market over the next few years.

The design would need to be entirely custom, and we would need someone capable of both the design and prototyping phases who is familiar with both revolvers as well as tactical items such as grenade launchers.

What sort of budget is reasonable for design and prototyping of a new firearm?

Who would you recommend we look at when we look for people with competencies to pull this off.

Yes, we are still in the daydreaming phase, but the money is there to pull this off if we really desire it.
 
Half a million give or take a hundred thousand.

I would look for a 3D printer programmer guru. Make your prototypes out of plastic first so that function can be observed. Much cheaper that way as well. First thing you need to do is put some sort of design together with the changes you want to incorporate. Then look for someone to iron out the fine details.
 
A quick Bing search of Rotary Grenade Launcher gives you almost a dozen results so it's a crowded market. There was a really slick under barrel launcher for the M4 at SHOT two years back that featured a three or four shot cylinder.

Depending on where you had the work done the price would vary. Canada or the US you'd have to be looking in the 500k to a million range just to get a basic proto up and running. South Africa/Brazil/Croatia you might be able to find a bargain and not have to stress as much about export controls on the IP.

Step one would be to find a good lawyer who can delineate the step by step process from design to prototype fabrication to eventual production.
 
GSG1911 said:
A quick Bing search of Rotary Grenade Launcher gives you almost a dozen results so it's a crowded market. There was a really slick under barrel launcher for the M4 at SHOT two years back that featured a three or four shot cylinder.

Depending on where you had the work done the price would vary. Canada or the US you'd have to be looking in the 500k to a million range just to get a basic proto up and running. South Africa/Brazil/Croatia you might be able to find a bargain and not have to stress as much about export controls on the IP.

Step one would be to find a good lawyer who can delineate the step by step process from design to prototype fabrication to eventual production.
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Let me stop you there..... you use bing?
 
electricjesus said:
rough cost estimates for ground-up design and prototyping of a new revolver.

Myself and my business partners are potentially interested in bringing a new firearm to market over the next few years.

The design would need to be entirely custom, and we would need someone capable of both the design and prototyping phases who is familiar with both revolvers as well as tactical items such as grenade launchers.

What sort of budget is reasonable for design and prototyping of a new firearm?

Who would you recommend we look at when we look for people with competencies to pull this off.

Yes, we are still in the daydreaming phase, but the money is there to pull this off if we really desire it.
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Trying to invent a better wheel is going to be very costly... with extremely low chance of success. A revolver is a revolver. How do you make it more unique and reliable than the extremely large manufacturers have been doing for the last 100 years...
 
electricjesus said:
Myself and my business partners are potentially interested in bringing a new firearm to market over the next few years.

The design would need to be entirely custom, and we would need someone capable of both the design and prototyping phases who is familiar with both revolvers as well as tactical items such as grenade launchers.

What sort of budget is reasonable for design and prototyping of a new firearm?

Who would you recommend we look at when we look for people with competencies to pull this off.

Yes, we are still in the daydreaming phase, but the money is there to pull this off if we really desire it.
Click to expand...

I think you are screwed already, if you have to bring other folks in to make your idea work, even just at potentially prototype stage. I see a money-sucking pit of a project that has little chance of paying off for anyone but the auctioneer that deals with the disbursement of the Company Assets after the money runs out.

How much money can you afford to see burn?

Do you actually expect to see any profit at the end, or are you willing to flush the money away for the warm fuzzy feeling of having your name on the side of it?

Cheers
Trev
 
One major hurdle is that a lot of the parts are highly specialised. Your average machine shop doesn't have the capability of rifling a barrel, and with a lot of parts, you will need fixtures made even for a one off and fixtures can eat up a lot of cash real quick, especially for a prototype. We've done prototypes for the oil industry, and sometimes you have to make something half a dozen times before it works the way it's supposed to. Computer generated designs only get you so far, and if something needs tweeking, it often means making the part over again, but just a little bit different. One of the first things any machine shop will tell you is that if you have to sub contact something out, you're already starting to lose money
 
EHG said:
Exactly!
Very hard to improve upon S&W, Ruger and Freedom Arms, etc.

Grenade Launchers? Need good military contracts and trials. They want the cheapest and best for their money.
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Someone's got to come out with a polymer striker fired revolver. :)
 
bearhunter said:
Half a million give or take a hundred thousand.
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Can I ask what your estimate is based on? Just curious.

GSG1911 said:
A quick Bing search of Rotary Grenade Launcher gives you almost a dozen results so it's a crowded market.
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Close, but completely the opposite of what we are interested in :p we were thinking more along the lines of http://dailynewsdig.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/handgun-with-30mm-grenade-launcher-2.jpg

trevj said:
How much money can you afford to see burn?

Do you actually expect to see any profit at the end, or are you willing to flush the money away for the warm fuzzy feeling of having your name on the side of it?
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Were hoping this would be possible to do at ~100k. If the quotes above are correct we likely will not pursue at this time

Profit would be nice, but its more a case of flushing money to create something unique.
 
In regards to development costs, lets put it this way. The Fox 40 plastic whistle was developed by a fella a good 20 + years ago. At that time it cost him approximately $140 K to get it designed properly and set for production. So it would be realistic to think that to design, develop an entire gun to the production stage in to-days dollars would easily exceed a half million, most likely a lot more.
I will be bold and ask the question many here are wondering, which is. Just what were you and your companions smoking and drinking when you came up with this idea??
 
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mrgoat said:
I will be bold and ask the question many here are wondering, which is. Just what were you and your companions smoking and drinking when you came up with this idea??
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we were pretty drunk. But we still like the gun idea, however we now realize our cost estimates were alcohol induced.
 
EHG said:
Exactly!
Very hard to improve upon S&W, Ruger and Freedom Arms, etc.

Grenade Launchers? Need good military contracts and trials. They want the cheapest and best for their money.
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But, first they have to grease a few palms to get it to the trials stage.
As mentioned re-inventing the wheel isnt going to make one wealthy let alone see a great return on investment.
Something like reproductions might be a better way of going about this project.
Specialized CowBoy Action shooters or something.
Rob
 
JMHO - I don't know about costs etc. but as suggested above, reproduction of something might go - like for instance a 455 Webley in stainless might be nice. --- John
 
You best bet it to have a template of eng p and designers offshore. It's a 10 for 1 cost

My partner with s&j is a eng p. They have 10 to 1 eng p in tiawan 1 in Canada 10 over there
This way things can be made faster and cheaper.
 
are you talking mass production or just a limited production?
if you have engineering and fabrication and machining abilities you could do all the legwork yourselves, fabricate, draw it up and test yourselves... lots of skills required but not impossible. they did it 100 years ago so why not?
 
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