Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/294

Rh 280 GUN MA KING [SMALL ARMS. house of the Company of Gunmakers at Whitecliapet or Birmingham. The scale of proof is fixed by Act of Parlia ment, according to the size of the bore ; it is considerably more than double the ordinary shooting charge. For the provisional proof, muzzle-loaders have the breech screwed in before firing ; breech-loading barrels are pressed against a false breech. The second or definitive proof is less severe, and is carried out at a later stage, when the action of the breech-loader, or the percussion fitting of the muzzle-loader, is completed. The best stocks are made of English or Italian walnut, pieces of which reach the gunmaker roughly shaped. They are so cut that the grain shall run lengthways down the stock, and the wood is dried and seasoned to prevent warping. For expensive guns, much attention is paid to beauty of mottling and depth of colour. A con siderable variety of tools is employed in shaping the stocks and cutting out the beds for locks, processes which, for sporting pieces, are performed by hand. All parts of the lock except the plate are of steel, and reach the gunmaker hammered into shape. The lock-plate is of wrought iron, case-hardened. The parts are worked to fit by hand with a number of special tools. Bar locks are those which have a forward action, arranged so thab the main-spring fits under the bar below the breech end of the barrels ; back- action locks have the spring reversed, so as to extend down FIG. 2. Early breech-loader. C, pin fire cartridge; S, single grip. the hand or grip of the stock. The remaining portions ot the gun are termed the furniture. They are the heel plate which covers the butt, the break-off into which the breeching hooks for muzzle-loaders, the trigger plate, the trigger guard, the ham mers, the escutcheons, and bolt fastening the barrel to the stock, &c. For breech loaders the action is a most important part of the furniture. The ingenuity of gunmakers has devised an immense variety of actions, and every day sees progress made in strength and simplicity. M. Lefaucheux is entitled to the credit of inventing the modern sporting breech loader. He first hit on the combination of a pair of barrels open at the breech, playing on a hinge and abutting against a false breech (fig. 2), with a strong-based cartridge-case containing powder and shot ready for firing, and supplied with its own means of ignition. His early guns were found weak in the fastening of the barrels to the stock, while the mode of p IG 3 Central-fire igniting the charge was far from perfect. cartridge. It consisted of a pin passing through the upper part of the cartridge case, the point resting just above a percus sion cap placed at the centre of the base of the charge ; the hammer fell on the head of the pin, driving the point into the cap, and exploding the detonating composition. The gas was found to escape through the piu hole, the ex traction was sometimes difficult, and a fall on hard ground would occasionally explode the cartridge ; for these reasons the pin system was superseded by the central-fire method (fig. 3), in which the base of the cartridge case was made to hold a small anvil, on to which the cap was driven by a needle or striker passing through the false breech, and receiving the blow of the hammer. Fig. 4 shows a central- fire gun, having the action considerably strengthened by the double grip. In this system the extraction is accomplished Fia. 4. Central-fire Gun. C, central-fire cartridge ; L, lever ; W, washer ; S, screw. automatically, by a piece of steel fitting between the two- barrels, and so cut as to clip the rims of both cartridges. To this extractor is attached a rod which runs down between the barrels through a hole in the steel lump as far as the hinge; on opening the joint the rod is driven backward, carrying with it the head and forcing the cartridge cases out of the barrels. Guns on the central-fire system afford no indication of being loaded; extraction and loading are, how ever, so rapid and easy that every sportsman should invari ably withdraw the cartridges on laying down his gun, and seload on ae;ain taking the field. Hammers sometimes FIG. 5. Improved breech-loading action. catch in the brambles, or even in the clothes of the shooter ; even the double grip has been known to yield under tho effect of the heavy charges now used. The latest guns leave little room for improvement in respect to the action. Fig 5 shows one of the newest developments. The hammers are abolished altogether, the striker being a needle in the interior, which is driven against the cap of a central-fire cartridge by a spring when the trigger is pressed ; a lever on the top is pushed aside by the thumb, liberating the catch which holds the barrels against the false breech ; the barrels then drop from the hinge, and are open for loading. On raising the barrels, the action snaps to, and holds them fast; the dropping of the barrels causes an extractor to withdraw the empty cartridge cases. A key at the side regulates the cocking and safety of the lock and striker.