Cartridges

After the discovery of smokeless propellant in 1886, the Austro-Hungarian army needed to modernise their old black powder revolvers. It was also during the middle of the 1890’s that the idea of the semi-automatic pistol was born but during their early trials the Army...

This was also a contemporary of the early French palm-squeezed pocket pistols based on the original Jacques Edmond Turbiaux design. It was manufactured by Manufacture Francaise, Armes Et Cycles, Saint Etienne from 1890 to the beginning of the 20th Century, but as with...

From the IHMSA website: In 1975 in Tucson Arizona, a group of dedicated hand gunners got together to have some fun. Those notable hand gunners included such famous shooters as, Lee Jurras and Harry Sanford of AutoMag fame, Jeff Cooper, Dean Grennell, George Nonte, J....

The 8mm Kromar is listed in Erlmeier, Brandt Vol. 1 p. 127 as a self-loading pistol developed in 1892 by Konrad Kromar. There is however some confusion over the 8mm Kromar, but according to Josef Motz and Heinrich Kohlmann, in their excellent book on Austrian Military...

By the time hostilities ceased in the Franco – Prussian War of 1870, the French realised that they needed a serious and urgent modernisation of their military capabilities. The handgun that they adopted at that stage was the 11mm Mle. 73 Chamelot-Delvigne. During the...

This was also one of the early French palm-squeezed pocket pistols based on the original Jacques Edmond Turbiaux design. The Merveilleux was designed by French firearm technician Jacques Rouchouse, who succeeded Félix Escoffier who was the manager of the Imperial...

As discussed under the 8mm Protector, this was another French invention based on the original Jacques Edmond Turbiaux palm pistol design. In 1885, two French firearm designers and business partners Pierre Blachon and Etienne Mimard purchased the Manufacture Française...

There seems to be a bit of confusion regarding the 8mm Nagant cartridge. Erlmeier, Brand Vol.1 p.131 lists this cartridge (Ref #94) as similar to the 7.5mm Nagant but loaded with a CN bullet with flat tip instead of lead, as the specimen shown above for their Model...

Kijirō Nambu (1869 – 1949) hailed from a modest background before joining the Imperial Japanese Army Academy at the age of 20 in 1889. Later during the mid-1890’s he was stationed at the Kokura Arsenal where he worked under well-known Japanese arms designer Nariakira...

This is the shorter (24mm) “civilian” or non-regulation version of the French Lebel M1882 revolver. It was an SFM development circa 1900 but was obsolete before the beginning of WW1. It is also similar, if not the same as the 8mm Tue-Tue revolver. (Erlmeier, Brandt...

Henri Pieper (1840 – 1898) was originally from Westphalia in German and was a mechanic by trade. In 1859 he moved to Belgium and set up shop at the rue des Bayards in Liège. At that stage, most firearm manufacturing was made up of a myriad of small factories. The one...

Erlmeier, Brandt Vol. 1 p.135 listed this cartridge as the Pieper Rimless under Ref. 98. This has been proven incorrect and the actual designation for this cartridge is the 7.8mm REYNOSO (EB Ref. 80). Reference will be kept on this page for information only.

The case dimensions of this Pieper with 37mm case length differ from the standard Pieper design. There was an IAA forum discussion about this, however there is not much other information regarding this version. Additional research will be added in time. (Erlmeier,...

The concept of concealed carry has always appealed to gun owners. That prompted French designer Jacques Edmond Turbiaux to come up with an idea to patent "A revolver which may be held in the hand with no part exposed except the barrel." He registered his design in...

This was a design by Austrian inventor Wasa Theodorovic. It was one of a range of long-recoil, locked-breech, single as well as double-action pistols and his financial backing came courtesy of Georg Roth. These designs were also entered into the Austrian military...

This cartridge with Roth #592 was the predecessor of the 8mm M.7 Roth-Steyr (EB 102). It was used in various early Roth, Frommer and Beliczay self-loading pistols. See also Mötz Vol, 3 p168 and 317. (Erlmeier, Brandt Ref. 101).

Josef Laumann was an Austrian designer during the early 1890’s who developed and patented a small number of manually operated pistols in his quest to design a reliable semi-auto pistol. These were developed for the Austrian military trials but were rejected. As a...

Whilst researching the 8mm M.7 Scharfe Pistolepatrone (a.k.a. 8mm Roth-Steyr), I got sidetracked for a while reading about the fascinating history and reasons for European rearmament during the period from 1860 leading up to World War 1. Historians tend to attribute...

Josef Schulhof (1824 - 1890) started out in life as a farmer but moved to Vienna in 1870 to work as a gunmaker. He was apparently a good shot and designed amongst other, a semi auto pistol as well as a rifle, but was more known for his target pistols, which were of...

Josef Schulhof (1824 - 1890) started out in life as a farmer but moved to Vienna in 1870 to work as a gunmaker. According to Rock Island Auction Schulhof patented two firearms, a rifle in 1882 and a manually operated repeating pistol in 1884, but that seems to be in...

From an earlier IAA Forum discussion, the so-called “8 mm S&W Experimental” is, in fact, a .32 WCF specially loaded for the S&W .32-20 Hand Ejector 1st Model (1899) revolver. It features a solid-head case and a 105 gr metal cased bullet. It was manufactured by...

One thing that can be said about early firearm designers, they could get creative. None more so than Norwegian inventor Harald Sunngård. He was granted US Patent 972087 in October 1910 for his Model 1909, and it was based on two assumptions, firstly that, when engaged...

This rare cartridge was developed by a French gunsmith G. Suter in 1895. Erlmeier, Brandt Vol. 1 p.95 describes it as a rimless version of the 8mm M92 Lebel revolver. This would have been one of the very early attempts at designing a semi-auto pistol. The specimen on...

This was an interesting design by Italian inventor Catello Tribuzio from Turin. He was granted a patent for his palm-squeeze pocket pistol in 1890. There were a number of these palm-squeeze pistols (Gaulois, Protector, Merveilleux) with the Tribuzio maybe the rarest...

This was a design by French designer Charles-François Galand (1832–1900). His original design was an open frame, double action revolver patented in 1868. It was manufactured in both 9mm and 12mm variations. The long extractor lever, serving as the trigger guard made...

There is very little info on the 8mm Ultra, all of which is duplicated on various websites. The consensus info is that it was a Gustaf Genschow & Co. development around 1934 for a Walther PP in order to provide an intermediate powered cartridge between the 7.65...

The 8.5mm Mars was one of four cartridges developed by Hugh Gabbett-Fairfax for submission to military trials in the beginning of the 20th century. The 8.5mm was different from the 9mm/360, 45 Short and 45 Long as the 8.5mm was submitted for the French trials. This...

Grey injection moulded plastic case with plastic bullet. SAPL is a family-owned French company, Société d'Application des Procédés Lefebvre. According to the WRI website, the company was founded in 1983 by Jean Lefebvre and its main business is the manufacturing of...