Forgotten Weapons

Top picture is silver medalist Thomas Paine from the 1896 Summer games, the first year with a shooting competition. Bottom is gold medalist Vitalina Batsarashkina from the 2020 games....

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16474034

"The [Winchester] Ringblaster® Industrial tool is a heavy-duty shooting apparatus that is designed for multiple industrial applications. The industrial tool is coupled with our specialized Ringblaster® Mount system which has a precision weight balanced construction that helps maintain bull’s-eye accuracy, with substantially...

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/HistoryArtifacts/t/840713...

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16804781

For the metrically inclined:...

https://www.rockislandauction.com/detail/78/3511/colt-t12-espionage-pen-gun-in-12mm-with-wooden-storage-box

The M79 grenade launcher is a single-shot, shoulder-fired, break open grenade launcher which fires a 40 x 46 mm grenade and first appeared during the Vietnam War. Because of its distinctive firing sound, it earned the nicknames of “Thumper”, “Thump-Gun” or “Blooper” among American soldiers; Australian units referred...

This armored mask featured very small eye slits, a cut away to get a cheek weld on a rifle, and a bend at the bottom to prevent spalling from striking it's wearer....

Saw this and thought someone here might find it interesting

CZ Tarantule was supposed to be used in cases where explosives couldn’t be used due to a high risk of collateral damage. The Tarantule uses a modified .50 caliber blank round loaded from the breech of the 18mm caliber smoothbore barrel to propel the 70ml of water which is poured down the muzzle and sealed in the bore via a...

Duck’s foot pistols are one of the iconic classic “weird gun” categories. This one exemplifies the typical pattern, with four barrels arranged in a wedge, fired simultaneously with a single flintlock action....

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/HistoryArtifacts/t/1039837...

The Velo-Dog... was a pocket revolver originally created in France by René Galand... in the late 19th-century as a defense for cyclists against dog attacks. The name is a compound word composed of "velocipede" and "dog"....

The ZKZM-500 is the subject of a July 2018 article in the South China Morning Post describing a laser gun purported to have been developed by Chinese researchers of the Xian Institute of Optics and Precision Mechanics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shaanxi. The article described the device in conflicting terms, both as...

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/HistoryArtifacts/t/837475

https://www.forgottenweapons.com/light-machine-guns/villar-perosa/...

Okay, so the name may not be considered very PC today – you could also call this a cross-dominant stock. The concept was to allow a shooter to mount the gun in one shoulder but sight with their opposite eye. This was useful for cross-dominant shooters (ie, right handed but left eyed) or shooters who had suffered a crippling...

https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/85a34fbc-342f-4122-8374-a9933d500a52.jpeg...

For anyone who wondered what made a minigun 'mini'....

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/HistoryArtifacts/t/826182

This gauntlet dagger – sometimes also known as a ‘punching’ dagger – is designed to be worn on the bearer’s arm like a glove during close quarter combat....

This seized .22lr improvised hand was made by modifying a staple gun, like you would use for upholstery, with a bent piece of sheet metal. The common but unofficial explanation I found for this was it was made in a prison....

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/HistoryArtifacts/t/847729

This less lethal launcher from UMX, a sub brand of the German company Umarex, has a built in range finder tied to a laser rangefinder that regulates an electronically controlled valve to ensure a projectile is launched pneumatically to hit a target at no greater than 30 joules of impact force....