Maxim Silverman Model 1896 Automatic Pistol
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ย. 2024
- Hiram Maxim is obviously best known for the Maxim Machine Gun, but he and (most significantly) his assistant Louis Silverman also dabbled in handgun design. It appears that the work was primarily Silverman's, done with the tacit support of the Maxim company. A followup version was made with more of Maxim's fingerprints on the design, but it never appears to have been produced - while three of the Maxim-Silverman guns are known to still exist.
This pistol began as a simple blowback action, albeit a clever and elegant one. It was chambered for the 7.63mm Borchardt cartridge, which proved to be too strong for a blowback mechanism to safely handle. This was remediated by the addition of a delaying spring added to the side of the frame to hold the bolt closed slightly longer during the firing process. The two other known prototype examples are in different calibers; one in an experimental 8mm version of the Borchardt round, a larger framed model in .455 Webley.
Overall, these pistols are simple, elegant, and quite ahead of their time. It is unfortunately that they were not given more attention at the time, but it is reasonable that the Maxim company would be more interested in devoting its resources to the military machine gun market.
Thanks to the Institute of Military Technology for giving me access to this pistol: www.instmiltech...
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only 3 in existence, Jango lost 2 of them in Geonosis and Gun Jesus has the last one
Samuel Watson Sure hope they kept them intact for the movie.
Actually Boba took them back (you can see him with those guns in one of the Clone Wars Episode) so they were probably lost during the formation of the Empire... ?
gun jesus! lmao best name ever for this guy xD
Damn he lost something expensive.
I mean his head
Samuel Watson yes you have right👍🏼😂
1896? This shit was so ahead of its time.
1896, it's more like 2096. I think it may be the the most beautiful and elegant pistol I've seen. No wonder Maxim didn't like it, he made a great machine gun, but it looks like farm machinery, especially compared to that thing!
You can probably understand why they decided to invest in their machine gun business.
They were making a profit off of selling machine guns, but semi-auto pistols were kind of seen as a newfangled novelty at this time.
I mean, it looks great, but many people at this time have not seen value in a semi-auto pistol. Why use that thing, which can jam, when you have your old reliable revolver?
"If you want to make a fortune, invent a machine that will help these Europeans kill each other." Well, he did and he did. Still, if someone took up that design and fixed the problem with using powerful cartridges, you could sell a ton of them on looks alone.
Its fucking steampunk gun! I love it!
HKIMN2 especially seeing as most of the good service pistols came 30 years later
This one deserves to be replicated. Simply breathtaking.
It would be nice if someone produced this gun in .22lr. nice plinking potencial :)
Like the SW 22Victory too, but prettier.
It's called a Ruger MKII.
@Daniel Nunez so obviously you've never handled a Ruger mk pistol.
@The Weapon Collection you mean mark 2. The mark 2 being the best of the bunch and also having a heel type magazine release
@Mauri Mela the mark 4 isn't an upgrade. the Mark II is the best of the Ruger Mark series as far as performance and shoot ability. Some people have trouble with the disassembly and reassembly of pre Mark 4 Ruger 22 pistols those people are morons.
Looks like something you'd see in a James Bond movie.
nosferatu5 color it gold and it would be worthy of Scaramanga.
you mean star wars
We all thought it
Maybe moonnraker
"Its elegant and simple"
Me: "a weapon from a more civilized age...?"
lol
Maxim Silverman sounds so slick and the gun really matches it
For such an early design, it's extremely well thought out and simple.
The design looks pretty slick. Especially the right grip panel with the holes.
It's really beautiful in it's simplicity.
This is, perhaps the most beautiful sleek handgun I have seen. Reminds me a lot of the automag of years gone by.
Almost look like a Star Wars gun... It is really cool and kinsa wird that they didn't look more into it.
It is jangos gun
That ejection system is absolutely brilliant. It's like an ejector piston.
mrzoperxplex Fair points, I just find it mechanically unique and interesting. It's not like a cotter pin on an AR15 bolt is much harder to lose, for example.
As always, informative, erudite, entertaining and very interesting.. Thank you.
As Pablo Picasso said, the ultimate critic is the person who spends his money to buy your painting. Not an exact quote, but if this pistol ware available in .22 LR today, I'd buy it.
Why do Brits always have the coolest looking guns?
Orson Welles The Germans do IMO
Orson Welles
Lewis gun is my favourite British gun, beutiful
You forgot Sten....
They actually have a reputation for making absolutely hideous firearms. Just look at things like the Sten, EM-2, L85 or the Sterling. I'm not saying they don't work (well, except for the L85, that thing is just a piece of crap) but they aren't exactly visually pleasing firearms.
edit: I should add that there are of course exceptions like the Lee-Enfield, that both look good and work well.
Osh Thomas the Lewis gun was designed by an American though
Someone should use this design as the basis for a high-end Target Pistol.
They do its called ruger
Yeah, rugers been doing it since the 50's
It is both an elegant design & truly astonishing that something so apparently sophisticated & modern was made over a _century_ ago..! Remarkable.
I'd like to see a modern developer try to build on this pistol, using up to date materials & replacing any obsolescent aspects with current design components.
This is one of the most beautiful guns I have seen on this channel.
The beauty of simplicity.
This pistol design was genius both in form and function. It's easy to see its potential. Too bad for us that Silverman's accomplishment was suppressed. Awesome job of digging up this impressive gem. Thanks!
I find your voice soothing...your sorta like the Bob Ross of firearms. Great vid Gun Jesus!
"And make sure your Bergmann pistols are happy Bergmann pistols..."
this geometry is great having your hand close to the bore will help with recoil, vary clean design, i want one!
Such elegance in form and design
very cool obscure pistol, thank you for bringing this to us Ian
Very well machined. Looks like some futuristic stuff
Somebody has kept that thing in ludicrously good shape - could have been made yesterday.
Waita minute.... the patent on this thing must be expired by now.... therefore I don't see to much of a problem adjusting the design and remanufacturing them in the modern day. Maybe we'll get lucky and someone will decide to bring the Silverman back.
Then we're gonna need a lot of luck, I'm still waiting for someone to reproduce the Burgess Shotgun.
I'll give it a shot seems simple enough.
evilcowboy how's the Silverman coming
Ian's video on the Burgess Shotgun is featured in the Popular Mechanics article on same.
@@evilcowboy reproduce it yet?
A beautifully simple & sleek weapon.........
That gun looks straight out of a sci-fi movie, also maxim and Silverman's relationship sounds like the one between Edison and Tesla
christopher zarcone Jango Fetts blasters if I'm right.
No, Maxim and Silverman worked together for many years. Edison and Tesla were rivals and hated each other's guts.
That is a very minimal design but I agree with Ian it might have really stood out above pistols of the same time, this really fits the channels name
Today I understand the delay in delayed blow-back. Thanks.
Nice! I really liked the simplicity of this pistol when I saw it on your site, glad you found one to make a video
That is an extremely impressive piece, this Maxim guy really blew it.
This would’ve been a great weapon for BF1. BF1 is infamous for having weapons that were experimental.
This is better machined than many ww2 era guns
for its age that gun looks brand new, awesome looking gun.
Only 3! What a shame. So beautiful.
Ooh, now that's a beautiful piece! Extremely slick-looking; amazing to think that something so advanced is old enough that it's not even considered a firearm by U.S. law! That would be a terrific thing for someone to polish the design the last little bit (I'm looking at that delay mechanism, of course) and produce today. 7.62x25 Tokarev is around still, which is a direct descendant of 7.63 Borchardt, so that would be the natural calibre choice.
I really like this space age design; ahead of it's time. As soon as I saw the thumbnail, I clicked watch later. Did Ruger use this design concept for their iconic .22 pistol? I never liked the Ruger take down lever in the back gripstrap, so I traded mine in for a High Standard which I am still shooting 50 years later. Too bad Silverman wasn't working for someone else who would have appreciated his design, made possible improvements, and put it on the market. Tis a gift to be simple.
You'll never get away with it Ian, your fingerprints are all over that gun, and so very clear.
Very interesting, such a simple design that still looks futuristic in a steam punkish sort of way
Such interesting history. To think how many Jedi died by those blasters. Impressive history.
Beautiful Pistol! So Elegant!
Good morning and thank you Gun Jesus !
It's a shame this never went into production. Very interesting pistol.
Incredible. It looks like something from the middle of 20th century and it's half of century older...
So bare bones yet so elegant.
silverman the man with the golden gun.
It sucks that basically because of competition, 7.62 Borschardt, 7.63 Mauser, and 7.65 Parabellum (Luger) are all non-interchangeable proprietary rounds. So, basically the only bottlenecked .30 caliber pistol round we got was 7.62x25mm Tokarev, which is dimensionally identical to the Mauser round, but high pressure, so it's not safe to use in those guns. (Also, the Mauser ammo, if you can get it, won't reliably cycle the Tokarev.) Until .357 Sig, which doesn't appear to be going anywhere, either.
"Silverman"
"What Maxim"
"For gods sake focus on firearms for one second"
"What"
"Design me a pistol or you're fired!"
*silverman makes this pistol*
"God dammit silverman here give me that thing"
"B-but"
"Clearly I have to do this myself"
Maxim and Silverman could be a drunk history bit
I love the aesthetics of this one. I think I mentioned it when it appeared in the "early handguns and ammo" video, but it looks to my eye like what a Ruger pistol would look like on the cover of a 1950s sci-fi novel. Sort of Bill Ruger meets Ralph McQuarrie.
looks a lot like a ruger
Andrew Eisen it pre dates the luger
DerpBomb Gaming (((?))))
What?
He edited his comment to ruger, and the gun was made in 1896 so it predates both the luger and ruger
DerpBomb Gaming, he didn't edit his comment though.
Wow, I bet this thing is super comfortable to point.
I am in love! Interesting design.
The best guns channel))
Woah! Now that's what I would call a really cool piece of engineering.
I don't really like any pistol, but this thing is beautiful. Such a shame it never went into even limited production.
Inercia recocks the striker but i think it happens at the end of the bolt travel,when the spring is almost fully compressed, not at the beginning, thats why you need a powerful catridge and heavy firing pin.
Truly a more elegant weapon for a more civilized age
This is a surprisingly beautiful handgun! Reminds me of a graceful version of the Ruger .22 which is itself a fine little thing.
Am I The Only On Seeing The Ruger Standard In This Pistol?
its so nice to watch a video showing british weapons
Another fascinating one, Ian. The grip angle topic is interesting, with one of the comments below mentioning James Bond. A lot of the early Sean Connery publicity posters feature him holding a pistol with a sharp grip angle, the Walter LP53 target air pistol. This gun became strongly associated with J.B. To the extent that it carried on into the Roger Moore years. Another Brit gun that has a sharp grip angle was the BSA Scorpion, also an air pistol, and used in some Bond publicity shots when they couldnt get hold of an LP53. Maybe this Silverman could have become the official Bond gun instead of the PPK?
I'm in love. That is a awesome looking firearm. It looks like it would be a very comfortable pistol to shoot.
That is a beautiful design
What a beautiful gun. Love the styling. some clever stuff for the time going on inside.
Imagine the design evolution if this pistol took off back then
That thing is as Art Deco as possible. What a beautiful sexy machine!
Gun Jesus had to travel all the way to Geonosis to review this thing, talk about dedication.
Daemn! The pistol is like a Japanese Nambu! Cool gun!
The design is so sleek and elegant, can someone please make a modern version of this pistol, .22 Cal.,9mm., and .45 acp.
Ruger has been making them in 22 for 70 years
Another great video. Thanks Ian! 👍👍
I can see this being a very important and iconic historical gun if it had been taken more seriously by Maxim
It would be so nice to get a modernized version of this.
Indeed elegant!
Seems like a pretty intelligent design to be so old
"thats right man.... you don't f*ck with da gun jesus."
I’m always amazed at the fact that the concept of a self loading firearm was created in mid 1800’s. This is something that the anti-gunners don’t realize, the basic tech is well over 120 years old.
It looks like William Ruger liked the look of the Maxim-Silverman when he designed the Mark One, as the general look and some details are similar.
It's a work of art.
Thank you, very interesting, simple and at the same time thoughtful design, it looks as if you can make something similar at home
Very simple. I like it.
Someone really needs to find the plans for this gun (if they still exist) and do a little more R&D so that they can start manufacturing them. Chamber them for a modern cartridge like 9mm, price them reasonably and I bet they'd probably sell fairly well. I know I'd buy one if they weren't hideously expensive, because that is a really elegant looking gun.
I wish there was a replica manufactured of this
Elegant looking gun.
Great video. A shame it didn't get produced. It just needed a better delay system then all those modern features could have been in the market sooner.
Makes me wonder what exactly defines a locking breech. In this case the external spring puts a large holding force on the bolt but once it's overcome it no longer really affects its motion. It seems in effect that spring does "lock" the breech.
The difference is that a locked breech cannot be opened simply by pressure on the breechface (short of breaking something).
Very very cool and beautifully pott together.. but its is actually a machine-pistol.. or did I miss anything?
Looks beautiful 😳
Re production of this gun would be nice !
Good looking gun.
that's a beautiful looking gun!
HOW an elegant good design
100+ years! amazing!
What about the gold looking version we only saw as a scan? The damn thing looks a bond gun. Particularly like the man with the golden gun.
For being from 1896 that thing looks brand new.
this thing is so pretty
I like the looks of it quite a lot... simple... almost bauhaus...
I need it... that is such a beautiful pistol ;-;
Wow very impressive!