On the way home.

Had some medical appts. Worked out ok.

Good bit of driving time. Time to design stuff. Check on the back room's ideas.

Hope you all have enjoyed some recreation experiences recently. Hope
You share. Anybody shooting?

Gary



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/11/2014 10:31PM by barnespneumatic.

Hey Gary
Glad things went well. No shooting goin on here but alittle snow here and there will help with the white tail season ! High of 36 deg tommorrow . Did pick up a little gem I got awhile ago and always think of you when I see it. It was made in mid 1800's in USAby a Canadian . It's a 13 shot revolver with a lever assisted cocking mechanism similar to the one I saw you make a while ago . When I look at it I think of a man in the garage designing and prototyping his ideas into a finished product much like your self . ( Outriders and such) . Nothin to fancy but still a very elegant gun . I also saw one in the buffalo bill museum which has an awesome collection .Hope you enjoy seeing other works of art as much as I do.

Thanks Kurt!

Great Piece! Enjoy.

Many interesting things to trace there. Is it functional?

The linking driving the piston must house the spring in the buttstock. A bunch of work then. The maker had to know a bunch of guys were gonna show up Friday night to compete with that pc.

Gary

Well, that is certainly different! I've been interested in firearms for a long time but I've never seen anything remotely like it. Do you disassemble it to load the cylinders? What caliber? Percussion cap primed, or cartridge?

He will get back to you Sean ... but it's a "Gallery Gun". Air. Spring Piston. Used in sporting galleries, pubs, etc. They were very expensive - one man could hardly own one. Pub owner would buy one for an attraction - so I've read.

Gary

Gary,

I am glad you explained that I was thinking of what the holster would look like? I guess it shoots round balls?? Just a a guess. Does have a name and manufacture? Looks .177 or .22 or close..

It is really a nice piece I would love to know more.

Great piece of history.

Thanks for posting it Kurt.

It is something to keep. Great find!

Larry

Hey Sean , Larry , Gary
Gary is correct in the description of a " gallery gun " . It's called an "upstate New York " style . It is not marked by a maker with his name but in design only . I believe it's a Charles Bunge of Geneva New York . The barrel mic's out at .246 so it must be .25 cal round smooth bore . ( darts were popular too) The trigger set lever works and sets as it should and trigger releases but if you notice in pics it is stuck between loading ports . I'm going to have to fabricate a type of leather strap wrench and soak in down to break it free .( kinda scered ) but I will eventually . You load in front hole as seen in picture and turn and insert ball till all magazines are full . It has a external spring detent that lines up with divot in cylinder . After each shot you have to manually turn to next divot to line up with barrel , cock and repeat . It is a complete unmolested airgun so I'm going to be very methodical as I disassemble . I was extremely lucky when I noticed it (no description) at auction and immediately recognized from a book I have by Wolff. These men were the GBarnes of the 1800's with vision beyond there years . I really appreciate the mechanics of the way it was designed and can't wait to get it apart and investigate the internals . Externally it has a tapered steel bull barrel and is very heavy . The one I saw at buffalo bill museum was real similar and I believe another maker C Werner also made a similar design with either 12 or 13 shot mag almost identical .I hope I explained it's operation ok . There is a lot doing on with the outside and inside of this airgun . The OD of brass tube containing the leather seal measures 2" . The gun is almost all brass/ bronze except for the barrel and cocking levers. So with 2" cylinder about 7.5" long I would think the volumn of air generated would make some power . Hope you enjoy as much as I do .

Ah...all is clear now. A nice piece of work, and a clever design. It'll be very interesting to see what shape the internals are in once you've got it apart, hope it's not too much work to get it running again. That does look like a pretty big air volume for a .25, though it looks like the spring behind it has to follow the curve of the stock if I'm envisioning it correctly.

It is a great piece of history . I don't think the spring goes too far back in the stock though . It appears to be a small cavity for the loaded spring to store it's energy . I did find this patent pic which is kinda vague and not to scale of my airgun being it showes no recess in stock where it does curve down into grip area . I will certainly take photos when I do get it apart . I think it will be as clean or cleaner on inside than on outside . I've got some nice leather seals or maybe even fashion some good rubber I have after a little clean up and maybe a gental hone and a good soaking , I'm sure it will fling some lead .

I'm in the shop looking on the phone - but I suspect that's a different gun.

I'd be surprised if your gun used a straight coil spring as the drawing shows. I suspect it's a monster "Volute" spring. Where the spring is a concentric spiral which bends edgewise.

The cocking slot of your gun shows you that your spring has a short total stroke.

The length of the cocking lever of your gun suggests that the spring load is a beast.

Now, the 2" diameter does not mean more air. It would be harder to compress the are of a 2" diameter piston then the area of a 1" piston, for instance. Think
Of the typical spring piston guns you see. Approx. 1" piston that has a stroke of quite a few inches. I believe what you are seeing here is that the builder "needed" a 2" piston (which also fit his revolver idea's scale) and this he needed a monster spring to drive such a large piston. The Volute spring would work, and that lever would cock it.

That's just a quick flash from the boys on my back room. The way I'd have made it given the exterior I see there.

Time will tell!

Gary

That makes a lot on sence to me too. I know volute springs were used a lot in other old school guns and they are powerful for there size. Charles also invented ( kinda) a revolving pill~ block design for The powder burners very similar to the airgun design . You had to load down end of barrel with a ramrod . I would think the airgun design came after since he added a some what breach style loading port . Both guns look very heavy and like you said Gary , probably the smallest he could fit 12-13 .25 cal ball's in a circle together would be why diameter was so large . . I did notice in pics that a short horizontal magazine with 4-5 blombs appear in drawings increasing capacity to ??? MORE ! In this pic, the notch in front aligned the barrel and firing pin had to be sharp enough to penetrate hole in cylinder. Way cool stuff

I'll bet when you get it apart, you'll find that the cylinder is jammed between detents because something is stuck in there, not because it's corroded shut. Could be an old-style dart that's jammed up in there somehow, or a ball that got sheared or smeared, or somebody stuck something in the loading port that doesn't belong. Could even be a diablo-style pellet that somebody tried to make it feed. It'll be interesting to find out.

Ya Sean
I never thought about that , thanks ! I don't want to have to drill any rivets out and u can see a void when I look in loading port . I will try and turn alittle to line up detent and investigate hole for foreign objects like finish nails or bb's . There are no wrench marks on knurled area suggesting a force greater than ones hand .( which is good ) I'll keep y'all posted.

Hi Kurt,

You can research. Look for articles by Larry Hannish. Not sure of spelling. He's the last word on old guns. Used to be.

I know I once heard that some guns shot "clay balls". It's into memory. If so, you could even have some crumbled debris in there. Assume simple until you find worse (opposite of how my tormented brain works - but I think it's good advice -

Gary

Well the loading ports MUST be between barrel alignment notches or the ammo would fall out when shooting ! Hmmmmm I can see dust in loading hole rite now and it's between detent spring notches . Must get crow oil on and junior has a strong grip . Maybe it's not stuck . When you store a gun barrel up the loading port is open in between divots leaving access to hole.

Run a rod down the barrel and see if it's obstructed down at the base, it could be locked up down there keeping the cylinder from rotating. Given the fact that these gallery guns were routinely used in pubs and such it's not impossible that it may have be manhandled, and there might be a ball wedged in the junction. Who knows what might be stuck down deep in the mechanism, could be a rolled-up thousand dollar bill.

In going for long lost Civil War Documents. Better have an expert unroll them!

Gary

Sean
Who's face is on $1000 dollar bill, Ted Nugent ? Hehe I did try sticking a piece of soft brazing rod down there but I'm sure I could be a little rougher with smooth bore . Maybe I'll measure this time to locate depth of barrel .

Hey Kurt,

Be on the lookout for Grover Cleveland. If your're REALLY lucky, it'll be Woodrow Wilson.