A question I have been asked by several different people in several Q&A threads is: “Does the Savage rotating-barrel system actually do anything?” In his 1905 patent, Elbert Searle specifically claims that his design creates […]
Today we are looking at clips and how they work. There are two different types; Mannlicher-style and Mauser-style. Mannlicher clips were introduced circa 1885, and are also known as en bloc or packet loading clips. […]
Toggle actions are a relatively exotic locking system that are relatively common and well-known because the system was used in a pair of particularly successful early guns: the Luger and Maxim/Vickers. There have also been […]
Short recoil is the most common system used today in self-loading handguns, and it also used to be fairly popular in machine gun designs. The basic principle is that the bolt and barrel (in a […]
In a controlled feed rifle design, a cartridge slips under the extractor as soon as it is released from the magazine. This means than if the bolt is retracted before being locked into battery, it […]
Roller delayed blowback originated in the Mauser company R&D department when engineers were attempting to design a roller-locked version of the G43 rifle. They found that when the bolt bounced in automatic fire, the system […]
Roller locking is a system that is not used in many guns and often confused with roller-delayed blowback – which is understandable, given the similarities between the systems. Roller locking is really a sub-type of […]
Lever-delayed blowback is a relatively uncommon action system, although it is applicable to a wide variety fo firearms and has been successfully used in submachine guns, rifles, and light machine guns. It uses a principle […]
Eugene Stoner’s AR-10 and AR-15 use an operating mechanism that is often called “gas impingement,” but which is actually a cleverly structured gas piston located within the bolt carrier. Gas is tapped form the barrel […]
Gas-delayed blowback is a relatively uncommon operating system used in handguns. It is not an efficient mechanism for high-pressure rifle power cartridges, but works well with something like 9mm Parabellum. It tends to provide benefits […]
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