Revolver
Revolvers are a multishot firearm in which the rounds are held in a revolving cylinder which rotates to fire them through a single barrel. Revolver type weapons are part of the long development of making better multishot weapons. They were partly an attempt to improve on Pepper-box type weapons which used a revolving cylinder with one set of firing mechanisms, but had multiple barrels as well. Firing through a single barrel saved the expense and weight of having the multiple barrels of the Pepperbox. Earlier weapons had multishot capacity but used multiple barrels and firing mechanisms which greatly increased the expense and the weight of the weapon. Revolvers have remained popular to the present day in many areas, although they have largely been supplanted by semi-automatic magazine fed pistols such as the Colt 1911 in places where reload time and higher bullet capacity is important.
A revolver works by having several firing chambers arranged in a circle in a cylindrical block which are brought into alignment with the firing mechanism and barrel one at a time. A single action revolver requires the hammer to be pulled back by hand before each shot. In a double action revolver, the trigger pull can pull back the hammer as well as release it.
Most commonly such guns have a five or six shot capacity, however, some revolvers have up to 10 shot capacity (this often depends on the caliber, though different companies produce revolvers in the same calibers with different capacities, due to other design differences) and each chamber has to be reloaded manually. This makes the procedure of reloading such a weapon slow (even with the help of such devices as quick loaders). The alternatives are a replaceable cylinder, a "speed-loader" which can reload all chambers at once or a moon clip that holds half or a full load of ammunition.
Due to the simplicity of design, a revolver is cheaper to make and can have higher reliability as compared to other multi-shot firearms. For these reasons, such guns are the most commonly owned weapons for personal self-defence. There generally lower magazine capacity and high reload times have seen the them fall out of favor with most police and military users however. The type does live on however in some other weapons used the military. Some Gatling guns and Grenade launchers use mechanisms similar to revolvers.
Invention
Elisha Collier developed a flintlock revolver in 1818, and numbers were being produced in London by 1822. Samuel Colt received a patent for his revolver on February 24, 1836 and made the first production model on March 5 of the same year.
Famous Brands
See also
External Link
- Anatomy of revolver ( http://www.mcw.edu/fic/pages/glossary_revolver.htm )
Revolver is also an album by The Beatles.