Hey Forty Rod! - A truly .... ummmm Remarkable open top -

[Professor Marvel]

Madams and Monsierus, Dammen und Herrren, Senoras y Senors, Ladies and Gentlemen:

I present for your edification and entertainment a, shall we say, Remarkable open top percussion revolver in the style of a Colt, but, well, all I can say is that the photographs say it all - click on the photo at the website for a larger view:

http://xavierthoughts.blogspot.com/2008/12/steampunk-percussion-revolver.html

This revolver has been described as Steampunk, Arabian, Middle Eastern, but I maintain that it could well be the sidearm of Gustavus, the nearsighted sharpshooter companion of Baron Munchausen .


I offer this unique , er, item, for general amusement, but especially for Forty Rod who was so enamoured of the Wind Up Percussion Rifle seen in this forum thread:  http://www.cascity.com/forumhall/index.php?topic=22463.0

yhs
Prof Marvel

[Forty Rod]

Weird.  I want one.

[Professor Marvel]

Ah Forty! I see you finally took the bait I left so many weeks ago :-)
Whilst I prefer your "wind-up rifle" I really must run down into town to collect some photos of a really unique revolving-turret-chamber flintlock rifle .

yhs
porf m

[Forty Rod]

I've seen both vertical and horizontal turret rifles, saw an unusual 'harmonica' rifle a few weeks back, a whole mess of 'pepperbox' configurations, but my favorite 'strange guns' are Roper single action revolving rifle, carbines, and shotguns and my son's .357 Mateba sixgun made in South Africa a few years back.

I like strange things.  Hell, I even like most of the people on this site, and they don't come much stranger.   

[Professor Marvel]

This is the first vertical turret flintlock rifle I have ever seen in the flesh. The owner and staff of the local toy store are very obliging to those who show sufficient respect and excitement, and welcomed me into the back room to drool over his rack of firelocks the like of which I have never seen outside of a museum!

Being the inveterate babbler that I am (in the flesh I am even worse- I have literally held forth on objects in the local museum and collected a gathering of citizens) I made several new freinds of the staff. Oddly I got into a conversation regarding Japan with a young former tech-sargeant (who had been raised there) and learned more from his first-hand experiences than I ever expected.

I also now have a standing invitation to come back any time with my camera gear and tripod. Now I need some time in between blizzards and emergency repairs, because I MUST handle that turret flintlock!

yhs
prof m

[Forty Rod]

FLINTLOCK?  I never even heard of a flint turret lock.  I've seen a couple of percussions and a pin fire once.

You gotta send pics of that one...lots of close-ups of the mechanism.