Chambers Flintlock Machine Gun from the 1700s
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 3 ส.ค. 2024
- / forgottenweapons
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Joseph Chambers invented a repeating flintlock weapon in the 1790s, and I think it is appropriate to consider it a "machine gun". The design used a series of superposed charges in one or more barrels, with specially designed bullets that has hollow central tubes through them. This would allow the fire form a detonation charge to transit through a bullet at the rear and set off a subsequent charge. The result was a single trigger pull to use a flintlock action to start an unstoppable series of shots. Chambers made pistol and musket versions, as well as a full-on mounted machine gun.
He submitted his design to the fledgling US War Department in 1792, but it was not accepted. He brought the guns back to their attention when the War of 1812 was declared, and this time he found an eager client in the United States Navy. More than 50 of the machine guns were built and purchased to use on Navy warships. This version had 7 barrels, each loaded with 32 rounds, for a total of 224 shots, at (apparently) about a 120 round/minute rate of fire. The British found out about the guns and made some effort to reverse engineer them, and there was also interest in France, the Netherlands, and Spain. Ultimately, the potential unreliability of the system prevented more widespread adoption, but the gun is a fascinating example of early automatic firearms.
For more information, see Andrew Fagal's article:
ageofrevolutions.com/2016/10/...
Thanks to the Liege Arms Museum for access to film this for you! If you are in Belgium, definitely plan to stop into the museum, part of the Grand Curtius. They have a very good selection of interesting and unusual arms on display.
www.grandcurtius.be
Contact:
Forgotten Weapons
6281 N. Oracle #36270
Tucson, AZ 85704
"Stop firing! We surrender!"
"Not for another minute and a half, you don't!"
That was a good one.
I like your thinking
The Rogue Wolf right!!! Poor bastards! 😂😂😂👍👍
This ship doesnt take prisoners
The Rogue Wolf I know it’s a joke, but it’s probably not to hard to simply redirect the last shoots into the sea. If anything the constant cracking would dissuade anyone from getting ideas....
Akwardly standing around while this thing keeps on firing
"You pull the trigger once, and it will fire for two minutes straight."
I didn't know a gun could have an anti saftey.
Probs why the navy liked them. If the enemy surrenders after a minute of shooting you can aim it at the ocean. Kinda tough on land.
@@overlorddante or if the enemy takes out your gunner, his musket is still fighting for a good while. you could possibly pull the trigger and throw that thing on the enemy ship....224 round grenade..
@@oluenionloppu You could have a locking mechanism on the turret. So you point at what you want, lock it down, pull the trigger, and leave it be while you go man the rigging or pull out your own musket.
You're all assuming It was reliable enough to always fire the entire payload, which Ian politely states It sure was not.
@@Arthurzeiro He was talking about the musket variant, by the time the heavy gun was around apparently that problem had been fixed (don't think it would have gotten adopted if it couldn't empty an entire load)
The guy's name was Chambers, creating something like this was his destiny.
Chambers: YES
ahahahahahah
Either that or a toilet.
@@r0cketplumber us Chambers are all potty
tis nothing. You kids should check up the work of Reginald Feedramp!
"CEASE FIRE! CEASE FIRE!"
Yeah, give me a minute or two on that
@Mystic 9811 LOL! "Ok sir, just let me fire this thing into the water for the next minute or so."
Yeah, I'm thinking this thing could be a bit awkward if someone was trying to surrender.
No surrender! We have blackpowder machineguns!!!!!!
Comes with it's own clearing bucket of sand.
@@WalkaCrookedLine "I would genuinely like to accept your terms, but that wasn't built into the design."
ian during yesterday's Q&A: machine guns wouldn't exist without smokeless powder
ian today: so here's a flintlock machine gun
give it a week and Othias will probably find out it was used in WW1 lol
I guess he forgot the Belton Flintlock as well
I was going to say this exact thing!
He probably meant practical machine guns.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
The gun you load on Sunday, shoot until Monday, then reload until Sunday again.
Toby Wood or load on Sunday, explodes on Wednesday and reorder a new one on Friday. (Funeral on Thursday).
Doesn't quite have the same ring to it.
@@john-paulsilke893 May be best not to mention that in the ads. Keep it to the small print. You know. The one where you need a microscope.
Literally was scrolling the comments section to see if someone beat me to the joke....
(ಠ_ಠ)
"Oh the founders could never have imagined assault weapons!"
>Some dude builds a flintlock metal storm and shows it to all the founders.
Yeah and it failed
underrated comment xD
@@samuellubell4557 It worked well enough to be purchased in quantity and formally adopted by the Navy. It couldn't have been that bad.
@Swampy it's not an assault weapon though this is much more akin to a light artillery piece and it did fail as it was intenteded for the army
@Swampy lol leftists generally like the second amendment
The original "Stop it! They're already dead!"
Except that you can't actually stop it
Shoot for 2 min, reload for 2 days.
Perfect timing, just as the smoke clears.
I think the gun would've been better if each barrel could be fired on the same flintlock, individually. Would make the gun more misfire tolerant.
Civil war era was full of fun times
Possibly trying to reload it in full view of the enemy, with it being mounted to the deck.
@@ianmacfarlane1241 It was not designed to be reloaded in battle, you would use them to sweep the enemy deck, then board, the.rest of the fight was carried out with pistols, swords, knives, etc.
Edit: never mind, Ian just said that.
This statement makes me so proud."They were trying to figure out how to get their hands on one, and then realized it was American and just went to America and bought one.
did you see the movie "highwaymen"?
retired cop was hred by the state to hunt down bonnie and Clyde.
needs firearms.
walks into a mom and pop sporting goods store and buys a Thompson, BAR, Monitor, etc.
walks out with an armload of firearms, owner following with an armload of firearms and the owner's son following with an armload of ammo.
the good old days, before democrats.
@@MrYfrank14 Funny you mention that. I just had a discussion with someone talking about how the political parties switched and how in the 1940s and before Democrats were Republicans, and Republicans where Democrats. They told me that was the case because all the articles that say it happened, but then I mentioned, how did the parties change if the political ideas didn't. Democrats did gun control first, still were activists for more government intervention, abortion and etc. I never got a reply, so I don't know how they felt about it
@@Mrjohnnymoo1 yep and the Democrats are still the only political party to lead the country to victory in two world wars. The parties did not switch 1 for 1; the needs of the country changed and the parties followed suit. Examples: 1) when we had a segregated military the Blacks moved out of the South -- politics changed; 2) when we had the Cold War the Republicans came to the center; 3) when Civil Rights pissed off the South, the anti Civil Rights crowd joined the Republicans out of protest.
@@thesweatleaf Communism lead Russia through Two World Wars as well and they actually had to fight on their homeland un-like us as well. It has less to do with Republican and Democrat in times of war, mostly strong leadership. Although that is debatable when you have a single large enemy uniting both sides of a nation. I agree the parties didn't switch 1:1. We know their core values didn't switch, and according to the government source )www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/briefing/senators_changed_parties.htm) Only two Southern senators switched parties from 1938-1980. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina (Democrat to Republican in 1964), and Harry Byrd of Virginia in 1971 (Democrat to Independent) Far cry from the mass party change we read of. Funny enough David Duke supports Ilhan Omar and was supporting Tulsi Gabbard in her presidential race. I feel both sides are very corrupt, and at the end of the day, we need
@@Mrjohnnymoo1 It is a often-repeated lie that only a handful of anti civil rights Democrats switched to the Republican Party over Civil Rights. The true number is that between 1964 and the 1990s, over 400 influential Democrats defected to the Republican Party, and they came from federal, state and local levels of government. Seriously -- over 400 easily identifiable Democrats later became career Republicans in response to Civil Rights.
It is not true winning WWI and WW2 had nothing to do with Democrats being more able than Republicans. You must remember the Republicans disarmed America to save save a buck both times. FDR was a very left wing president who was elected 4 times for his ability to lead during times of extreme crisis.
BTW the communism argument doesn't hold up -- in 1960, Nikita Kruschev gave a speech to the Duma stating that "there will be communism in the USSR within 20 years". -- They never got it because the Soviet ruling class was just as inept at filtering resources as every centralized ruling class.
"We need to find a sneaky way to get one."
"Komrad, it's the United States, heres $50, go buy three at Sears & Roebuck."
Ahh thsoe were the days
An “assault musket”... it’s official...Franklin Armory will reveal this at next years shot show and produce it in 2030 lol.
This thing already has a jacked up proprietary projectile you can't fire out of any other weapon... so halfway there.
Assault muskets matter
Instead of the Revolution it will be the 1812. MOA just happens to be 18.12 yards.
You would have to make damn sure you were pointing it at the right people. Once you pull that trigger there's no going back.
I think you'll find that's true for all firearms, Big Blue.
Dude i just had a realization
Flintlock guns use caseless ammo
Petition to rename the chambers gun as the G11 Prototype V1
When you think about it, this thing is also a bullpup. The barrels are also the magazines, and they extended behind the trigger mechanism.
i can't believe i read it as
Flintlock guns use less ammo
Cakeyflour another thing he did say. Can you imagine how much smoke this thing would put out? Hell! I bet after a while you couldn't see what your shooting at because of all that smoke.
@@jason127x99 Shoot black powder a while thats rather normal after a few shots in succession.
“It wasn’t intended to be reloaded mid combat.”
Because you shouldn’t need to use it twice.
Imagine a full line of these things with the kind of reliability of a standard musket like the Brown Bess. That thing would be one hell of a game-changer.
@@RaderizDorret imagine this, but with the size of a 4 pounder swivel gun
I had no idea this weapon existed before today and I'm a fairly well read student of firearms. Ian, this is precisely the kind of content that makes supporting your channel a great investment.
The improbability of word combinations in this channel's video titles never ceases to amaze.
And the fact it's almost always never clickbait.
When you pull the wire on your 240 round runaway machine gun in the 1700s
LET IT RIP
I'm picturing an 1700s' version of the FMJ door gunner yelling "Get some!" as he hoses down an enemy ship's deck with this thing.
"May the ripping commence, Sir?" - "Permission granted, Mr. Moore."
Wonder what the lyrics for a 1700's "Beyblades" intro would be... :/
TALLYHOOO
After seeing Ian record this in the dark, I wouldn’t put it past him to break into a museum at night to make a video about a weapon.
I find it funny that the initial instinct of the Dutch was to try to steal it and only then did they realize that they could just buy it.
I suspect this weapon would've been an absolute morale crusher. The sheer volume of fire, the concussion, seeing your comrades being mown down and the disbelief.
bunch of 30 sailors line up in the deck ready to fire to the ship that have this gun mounted, they aim at 2 guys behind this gun.
when they are waiting for their superior give an order to fire, these 2 guys on enemy ship fire the gun and they see multiple gun firing from just 1 spot, injuring and killing their comrade slowly and surely like domino effect toward the sailors that have line up
Yeah... until it explodes in your face. And shreds half your own crew. There's a good reason nobody actually used these after 1812.
@@geoffrogers7590 Still morale crusher, just the other way around... :P
For real though, imagine sailing up to try and attack the enemy ship with your single shot muskets and cannons and all of a sudden one or two guys standing behind a single gun just start raining hell down on you for two minutes non-stop.
Imagine the morale crush if you're waiting the whole battle for the boarding action then on the right minute pull that string and the gun fizzles the first shot. No lever to cycle or way to unjam it just a big bunch of angry enemy marines.
Proof that mankind have been yelling "more dakka!" For a long time.
Not even just mankind, but the drive for more boom and more stick is a specifically American thing - it's awesome.
Also confirmation that mankind wanted to be the Empire of Sigmar, since it's very similar to the gun Outriders use.
Good shoota dis one.
“The big guns never tire.”
Paint it red.
Do you think this weapon came about during a "hold my ale" moment.
It was a Navy weapon. They would've been drinking grog, ya landlubber!
Yes, makes perfect sense,I imagine it would be just as scary operating it as being on the receiving end would be!
Relying on black powder to internally ignite 7 different rounds with no delays, malfunctions, or misfires?
I wonder why this wasn't widely adopted.
meh its already mounted i could build some redundancy's at the cost of weight...
It was heavy and really expensive
Each barrel acts as a sort of redundancy. Even if three barrels misfire you still have 4 to continue shooting.
Depending on which barrels misfire of course.
Having made reliable roman candles, some makers are better than others.
I remember reading about an electric ignition case less stackfire rifle that basically used the same inspiration. Since each round is fired by electric charge, it didn't have to unleash hellfire, but it could.
@@scottsammons7747 I need deets I want one.
The first MetalStorm guns? Remember when those were touted as the revolutionary “area denial weapon?”
I member, back in the history channels dying days
Theres also that 12 shot civil war pistol with superposed rounds
Why is there always someone on youtube who beats me to the comment, I hate the information age lol
@@kevinbooth2043; back before the 'History Channel' bought out, this was the period when they were breathlessly and dramatically promoting all sorts of things, I was told that there were serious efforts being made in the investment world to promote these things, and gain investors. Apparently, they were only really successful in their home country? However, I bet the company is still around.
Yeah, what ever happened to those guns ? Which, now I come to think of it I only ever saw in CGI. Was it a total fraud or was it one of those deals that kinda-sorta worked but never actually worked ?
"No one needs a gun capable of firing 30 rounds."
Chambers: *Hold my beer!*
Since it was PA, it proly woulda been "Hole my Yuengling!"
There were a slew of "advanced" firearms during the time: Puckle gun, Belton Flintlock, Ferguson Rifle, Kalthoff Repeater, Chambers Flintlock, Chinese rocket arrows, Hwacha, Hand cannons, Chinese lever crossbow, Duckfoot pistol, German wheel-lock rifles, Rampart guns, Volley guns, Death battery, German axe pistols. They had rifles that carried a handful of rounds also like the Girandoni Rifle that held 22-25 shots. (Mag limit argument). To suggest that civilians couldn't own any and all arms today and that the Constitution didn't cover them is preposterous. Do you believe that they couldn't envision that technology would advance? If you don't agree with these claims then Free Speech is also limited to goose-quill pen and an iron gall or carbon-based ink if that argument is consistent.
@@Raymo2u amen brother.
*Hold my grog
@@Raymo2u nice comment, im copying this to use in future arguments with anti gun people. Heller vs DC has already debunked the "2A for muskets only argument though". here is a quote from that case.
"Some have made the argument, bordering on the frivolous, that only those arms in existence in the 18th century
are protected by the Second Amendment. We do not interpret constitutional rights that way. Just as the First
Amendment protects modern forms of communications,
and the Fourth Amendment applies to modern
forms of search, the Second Amendment extends, prima
facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms,
even those that were not in existence at the time of the
founding"
i like how they are basically calling that a dumb argument.
"Smith, we got a misfire in the Chambers Gun, go clear it."
"Uhh, no."
Is it me or is the story of every weird U.S. adopted gun has tge same story?
"The Army didn't like it but the Navy thought it was sooper kewl
Look up some histories about army ordinance officers and their egos, it'll make plenty of sense. Example: M14...
The M16 was first adopted by the US Air Force. lol
I'd imagine part of it, at least with faster firing or higher capacity guns, is weight. When your power source for moving ammunition is not muscle, you can afford to carry more of it
120 rounds per minute....
On a musket
I want it
You can probably build this in a competent metalworking shop - the real issue is making the ammo and even that isn't that hard.
@@Finwolven If it isnt hard, it isn't an issue. I mean, it's lead. Doesn't get much easier then that.
Build one as an offering to Gun Jesus on his birthday!
Yeah, you better get in line buddy.
I want this, but in a modern, smokeless powder platform. I actually just want a modern machine gun. Nevermind.
Would this work in extended muzzleloader season?
I mean legally,
it's still a muzzleloader,
and there aren't laws about capacity for muzzleloaders,
sooooo....
Are you needing to thin a herd? Perhaps you need to kill a flock of geese that are destroying your crops?
@@williamsullivan9401 excellent link. Hahahaha. Love it.
@@kenycharles8600 Explore the link. Hunting feral cats with a mortar, too.
@@williamsullivan9401 excellent. That's just as funny !
@@williamsullivan9401 I'd like to see a feral hog hunt with either or both methods.
The story of how the Dutch got their hands on them is incredibly hilarious.
"How do we get our spies in place to steal one?... oh right, it's the Americans, we can just buy one!"
"The founders were only aware of Muskets, so that's what they meant"
The Founders: "Hey Mr.Bonaparte wanna buy a deadly roman candle?"
i didnt even think they had crap like this to be honest i knew they had better but this is literally the equivelant of a minigun but back then
or the hwatcha that was another weapon that was rapidfire like the minigun of back then and it was before this it was a primitive rocket launcher that fired them really fast
The people who try that line of argument need to become acquainted with the use of privateers in the American Revolution. Even a wee little 12 pound naval gun is a lot more destructive than any machinegun.
@@nathanbrown8680 indeed, cannons were specifically noted in the correspondence of the founders with privateers, sailors, and merchants. They asked "Hey can I have cannons on my boat to fend off pirates?" And the founders responded "That's what the second amendment is there for"
N!TR0Jackalope i dont know if they responded that way or not exactly but yeah thats what its there for for people to be able to defend themselves from who or whatever they come across that tries to harm them whether that be government thugs or regular street thugs or a charging animal etc that would hurt them and do it with whatever they pleased or feel they needed to do it with i mean think about if everyone didnt go by the so called "laws" they "pass" nowadays how much less crime there would owning everything the military has criminals would definately think twice and even other armies that are our enemies definately wouldnt want to invade us but people wont because they fear the big government and military/police that theyd go to jail or be killed
Runaway full auto? - now that sounds thrilling!
“Light fuse and get away”
Fully automatic, random target fire.
fire and forget
Like a runaway diesel... shes gon run till shes done
No you continue aiming as it fires.
"Sometimes it becomes a 60 shot gun, a 30 shot gun, I don't know..."
Apparently sometimes it becomes a bomb!
I think this is the best video Ian has ever done. The name dropping, diplomacy, the fact that it’s basically 7 Roman candles taped together, I love it
"Bid good day to mine little friend!"
Someone pin this comment.
TALLYHO, LADS!
Moral of the story : Never underestimate (or piss off) farmers from Pennsylvania
The Pennsylvania Garden groundhog gun😂
man casting that ammo must have been a nightmare
I'd imagine they were more 'crafted' than casted. Probably poured the general shape into a mold, then drilled a hole through the middle.
@@diktatoralexander88 Sounds plausible, still a lot of work by comparison! I bet back in the day these probably cost as much too shoot as some of the large magnum (338l 50bmg etc) CF rifles do today!
It wouldn’t be all that difficult. It looks similar to some early wadcutter bullets only reversed and with a hollow channel the full length. You probably wouldn’t want an 8 cavity gang mold for this design but a single cavity would be relatively easy to use.
I imagine that a component of this gun's poor reliability comes from it's intended surroundings... you load it up and you leave it until you need it. On a ship, in the damp.
I'd imagine they probably thought of that and like The Rake said, put a cover over it and plugged up the barrels.
Small beeswax plugs that could be shot through
Electrical tape! Yes yes i know they didnt have it back then but it works well now! If you like traveling in car with muzzle down its prudent to place some over muzzle to protect crown, no dramas shooting through it! IDGAF about my hunting guns but a mate uses a lovely very old sako and he does just this every time we go spotlighting.
They'd had water resistant tape since the late 1600s, and they've had waxed linen or hemp of the same resistance for longer...I'd say these were in a case, and wrapped in waterproof cloth, probably wax plugged, as said above, and maybe even with the case lid tape sealed....there would be plenty of blades on board in that era.
Ships closed slowly, you'd have considerable time to get them out and up in position, even if 'unexpectedly' stumbled upon an enemy ship, or she you.
I'd say most of the failure was the hit or miss loading, and ammunition, and the quality controls, or limits of, in that time.
I'm sure the US Navy was already well aware of how to protect their guns from the undesirable environs they operated in. Otherwise their cannons and muskets would be unreliable too....but most of the time they worked fine.
Equipping a ship with this and that seven-shot volley gun is the 1700s equivalent of those scenes in 80s action movies where the hero just holds down the trigger on their bottomless machine gun.
60% of the time, it works Every time!
There's a "shorter" one in Amsterdam and the Dutch blew one up - coincidence?
I thought the same hah
Seems like the Dutch were turning the one that blew up into a more concealable gun... /s
@@Darkxculo So did I.
@@no1DdC poket carry
What if they gave them a bad one on purpose?
Founding Father at demonstration : "But Mr Chambers, you can't fit a plug bayonet on it if the British get close" [Looks downrange]. "Never mind..."
Joseph Gaston Chambers is a close relative of mine. Along with this gun, he had also invented a repeating rifle and pistol (13 shots and 6 shots respectively, IIRC) using stacked rounds and charges and a ratcheting hammer system that worked its way to the rear of the barrel, as well as an underwater breathing system (which worked, but the sealant fumes almost killed him), and a phonetic system for teaching English. Pretty interesting guy. His correspondence with Washington and Jefferson can be found on the Founders Online archive.
Very cool. Thanks for this comment.
Unbelievable! Flint lock machine gun! Nothing is new under the sun.
This is proof of the Omnisiah.
When you think about it, its also a bullpup. The barrels are also the magazines, and they extended behind the trigger mechanism.
@@CakeyflourBY THE MACHINE GOD!
@@kabob0077 A bullpup caseless ammo machine gun utilising metal storm ammo stacking.
@@DGneoseeker1 suddenly synthetik
How amazing would it be for someone with the know how to build a functioning replica for you to use.
SOMEONE MAKE ONE!
It would be so easy. Just pointless and possibly super illegal. The blueprint is right there
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 it's a muzzleloader, I'm pretty sure a modern replica would not even be considered a firearm in the US.
@@Kaboomf it would definitely be considered a gun but it might not be illegal. But knowing the government they would find a reason to confiscate it if they felt like it
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 Why would this be considered a firearm when cap and ball revolvers are not? At least on the federal level I'm pretty sure that's the case.
Zack Rentz hold my Ale. This is going to be fun.
This is a ghost gun. This has ability with 7 bullet chambers to fire with 30 bullets in half. A. Second.
Weird because yesterday I was looking at a 1902 sears catalog. I opened to the gun section and was reading the descriptions. For the 'Colts Automatic pistol' (Colt 1900) it said 'this pistol is capable of firing 8 rounds in a single second!'
Quite a big claim for something listed at just $18.50... (I know with inflation, that's around $1200 today but still)
But where does one put the magazine clips?
@@dunxy simple you insert them into each 30 calibers chamber. In half a second of course!
For an extra .25 cents you could order the thing that goes up accessory kit
Wes Wolever wow! I’ll take 5! Can’t kill red coats 6 billion at a time with just a regular ghost gun! 😂
ok Ian needs to start a fund to get a replica made so he can shoot it for the channel.
Muzzleloaders are exempt from the NFA. A replica would sell. Better than a bump stock!
A replica probably wouldn't sell, nobody is going to want to spend an hour loading it just to get 2 minutes worth of shooting.
Perhaps... but I wonder how long it takes to load belts for a belt-fed machine gun. Probably not much different in the "loading time to shooting time" ratio.
@@ianfurqueron5850 I have seen a video of a us army machine for reloading belts for 30 call.
@@rodneyhalls8934 I wonder how often those come up for sale at the auction houses...
Gatling " I have invented the first machine gun", chambers " hold my beer".
Erik Stenberg ale*
I'm hoping that someone at some point recreates this gun and fires it, it must be spectacular
I bet it was amazing when it worked - all that smoke and fire!!
I for some reason just imagined someone fireing this from the hip. (I doubt you could actually do that, but dammit I want to see an 1810’s recreation of predator with this gun!)
David Whitehead ”Terminator Napolionic war”
Imagine this in a quad mount.
“If your volley lasts longer than four hours, consult a doctor, so we can figure out how the human body can contain that much freedom”
@@InquisitorJack 😂😂😂
@@InquisitorJack You sir, have won the internet for a day
Eight minutes
Naval Admiral: What is the appeal?
Chambers: Sir, one man can lay waste to an entire ship worth of sailors.
Naval Admiral: Huzzah! What are the cons?
Chambers: Well...it weighs a metric ton, takes 3 days to load, and takes 3 weeks to unload if you have a misfire.
"CEASE FIRE"
*All guns stop, Chambers Flintlock continues*
"I said CEASE FIRE"
"I can't, sir! Its still got 90 rounds!"
I really really want to see one of these shot
Metal storm million rounds per minute, early pattern. Volley gun with a twist. Nice!
@@therake8897 indeed!
@Deimos Cain me too
"the founding fathers did not have assault rifles"
chambers and his gun: let us introduce ourselves
Yes they did, any rifle used to commit an assault is by definition an "assault rifle",unlike all the semi auto's the antis like to refer to as such and are so irrationally scared of :(
Enjoy them (i cant..) and dont give the anti's an inch,i fear very soon here in Australia we are going to lose our levers and straight pulls,some "lever release" stuff has already been "re categorised" ,this is what they do here, they dont ban stuff (like semi autos which arent banned here) they just move it into a category of license they simply wont issue (to most anyway,depends who you know...) to normal shooters.So they re-classified lever release (verny carron and some rimfire that i have no interest in) into the category where if you have said license you can own real semi auto rimfire and shotguns anyway... Others are sooking at the "scary assault rifle like" performance level of straight pull rifles and shotguns(pump shottys already in un-obtanium cat but lever and straight pull currently are not) and crying for restrictions SMH...Im just thankful at this stage they haven't figured out how fast (the extremly prevalent here..) lee enfields are ,yet.SHH dont tell them or ill have to move, they aren't getting mine.
@@dunxy i honestly feel sorry for you that's just plain wrong.
@@dunxy ok this cant get wronger. An assault rifle is a rifle firing mid powered cartridges in automatic fire mode
I'm wondering if that "breech" plate at the back that looks to be attached with a bolt into the rear of each barrel is taken off to allow for clearing a misfired stack of bullets, as well as allowing for general access to the bores for a good scrubba-dub-dub time after a firing.
I'm guessing so.
Very cool.
Imagine having both this and Puckle guns.
No more need to turn the ship to line up all the cannons.
I've thought the same thing before actually.
One wonders if the gunner could see anything to aim at after the first few rounds. It is black powder gun after all. A fairly strong wind would help, I guess
Being on the masts of a moving ship probably helped with that.
Just make sweeping motions over the enemy deck. You are bound to hit something in the process and even if you don't, the amount of psychological damage you are inflicting should make up for that.
Heavy gas nade
Just hold the sights below the enemy's sails. You'll hit something...
“The second amendment only applies to muskets”. Gun grabbers aren’t gonna like this one!
Gun Grabbers: "I'm gonna pretend I didn't see that"
Heh
'Roman candle' muskets were well known back in the days of matchlocks but most makers stuck with one barrel - of course the Chinese had multi barrel ones with sticky incendiary bullets too, and kept using them until around WW2. There are some with multiple locks too as well as moving locks, so semi-auto. In the patent diagram Chambers has 2 locks, one for 'dump the mag' and a last, single round which also made it usable as a regular musket/rifle (just don't get the triggers mixed up)
Good for laying down a smokescreen.....
Legit what's the point of sights on a gun that would constantly obscure your vision lol
I would assume that in the sea, with strong winds and such, there's not that much of a problem
If only Ian was allowed to take this outside
I'd love to see a live demonstration of this thing
Wouldn't want to fire that one, that's nearly 250 year old metal. I would not want a continuous 2 minute firing of over 200 rounds in metal of that age. Something is going to fail when the barrels start to get really hot lol. That would be a really bad idea lol.
@@roadsweeper1 Wholly agree with that sentiment about shooting one of those antiques, I'm kinda curious about what the legal status of one of these things would be in the US since its a muzzle loader but with a bit of a twist.
I seem to recall that rules for muzzle loaders were fairly unrestricted, is it allowed to create a replica of one of those things and then use it at an appropriate location? Or would the multiple shots per "trigger pull" ruin things even for a muzzle loading firearm.
@@extrastuff9463 dont know about that. I'm UK based, and I'm wondering about the technicalities of it too. As far as I can see, theres no rules stating a muzzle loader has to be single shot per trigger pull, as it's probably largely assumed theres no such thing as black powder muzzle loaded machine gun. However, there clearly is lol.
But here in the UK, you have to register every single firearm to get it added to your firearms licence. I suspect of I told them I wanted to add a 7 barrelled muzzle loading musket to my ticket, they might be "woah there, hold on a minute, did you say 7 barrels?" and it would probably go downhill from there lol.
@@roadsweeper1 Nock's volley gun, as used in the BBC Sharpe's series.
@@ScottKenny1978 yeah love that gun. Would love to have one lol, no way that would ever be legal in the UK lol.
Dutch: "How do we get our hands on this... wait, this is _America_ , we can just _buy_ guns!"
'Merica
They were advertised for private sale in US newspapers
This is the mingun Arnold whould have used if the Terminator was in the 1790s
Ian you made fun of the Owen for looking like someone grabbed some bits out of the Plumbing department. Even just with black powder I'm not playing with that thing.
Hey guys, thanks for tuning in to another episode of Forgotten Weapons, I'm here today in the isolation chamber in my basement...
Man I wish we could see a live firing presentation
I just love how average dudes were sitting around thinking up stuff like this during the 1700s. Nowadays you have to be a certifiable genius to revolutionize any kind of technology
That's how I feel about the Weight brothers.
I think a very important factor is that before Public Education and increased methods of communication (Telephone, Telegraph, etc.) you would have a lot of actual geniuses who are never tapped due to the fact that no academics would know about "John Wheeler, Cow Farmer from the middle of nowhere." This guy probably *was* a genius, but he was not born wealthy enough to get private education or recognized.
@@spencergraham-thille9896 "... the Weight brothers."
MovieBob and Jim Sterling?
Yes, I know, the Wright brothers.
Gives " Away all boarders" a whole new meaning!
Omg. I so want to see a modern reproduction of this in action. Great video, Ian.
War department:"no way, that's dumb af I don't want this, no one woul-"
The navy:"hol up fam you don't speak for me, tell me more"
Thank you so much for showing this. It's amazing. I hope to someday see a reproduction fired, perhaps in a movie. So when our Founding Fathers of the US weren't shooting their Lorenzoni, Cookson, and Girandoni repeaters, or ordering Belton flintlocks that shot multiple superposed rounds to supply the American Revolution (a hundred such muskets were ordered by the Continental Congress for military use in 1777), they were shooting their Chambers high-capacity fully-automatic machine guns firing 224 rounds, several per second, for _minutes_ without reloading. I can't wait to mention this gun the next time someone who should know better tells me that in the 18th century people had not conceived of the idea of repeating firearms.
I'll explain to them that being handmade and complex machines, early repeaters were expensive to produce and often unreliable. The ones that were reliable were extremely expensive compared to the common firearms of the day, and required highly sophisticated knowledge to produce. The ideas existed then, but the manufacturing techniques to effectively put these advanced weapons into mass production had not yet been developed. Otherwise we probably would have seen a lot of repeating muskets and perhaps even machine guns on the battlefields of the American Revolutionary war and other conflicts in the late 18th century. The gunsmiths had functional designs, but engineering a functional design is only half the work of producing an object. There was no way to build enough of these guns at low enough cost with high enough quality control to make them common weapons. If they had designs for AKs and ARs time-traveled to them they would not have been able to produce them in quantity if at all, although we know the designs work. But if they had a modern factory with modern tools, they could have equipped armies with repeating weapons like these, since they possessed working examples made by the gunsmiths of the era. By manufacturing with more precision with less effort with better materials and a lower cost, some of these early repeaters could be made to work reliably enough at a price to have major military sales. The point is, the people of the 18th century had the firearms technology for effective repeaters, they only lacked the manufacturing technology to make them commonplace, which is why they were rare and are now obscure. Unfortunately so, because early repeaters are such a fascinating subject in the history of firearms technology. Videos like this are major sources of publicly accessible information that popularize knowledge of these firearms. I greatly appreciate it.
The first and second paragraph of your comment read like they were written by different people. How peculiar.
With modern manufacturing techniques, I wonder why we don't see reproductions of these early repeating designs. I think the other issue is that a lot of those repeaters were not the safest, especially for the overly litigious society we live in today. However, if they had AR-15s and AK-47s back then, the founding fathers would have wanted every man to have one.
Can't wait for a Batlefield 1812 game
Bruh, this just absolutely destroyed the "founding fathers couldn't have predicted weapons like XYZ"
So it was reasonable to carry around a 300lb brick of steel in your mind? When cars didn't even exist yet, so your only choice would be to haul it on a horse and carriage? Also like 35 years after the country was founded? And it was such a terrible weapon less than 100 were ever produced? Come on, you are just grasping bruh
Yeah. The puckle gun does as well. The problem is the antis are trained to not want to learn. Especially if it means they are wrong about a gun thing...a gun thing they are unknowingly wrong about in the first place.people want to be lazy and feel like they are right. They do not wamt to work to learn the propper info and actually BE right...cause why would anybody want to have knowledge ?
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 35 years is well within the lifetime of the founders. The point wasn't that you could do something with that particular weapon. The point was that saying the founders could ever conceive of a repeating weapon is absurd. This is an actual lead hose with arguably more firepower than an AR.
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 considering private ownership of cannons was supported I'm not sure portability makes for a good argument
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 1776 to 1790 isn't 35 years genius, and the puckle gun was around as well. Did you think these geniuses that saw literal innovation in their lifetime believed their would be no change in the future?
"The founding fathers could have never forseen things like machine guns" apperantly Franklin did.
“Shorter version” I would bet money that was the blown up one made to look pretty after fixing it
The most lethal roman candle ever
So it's like an ancient Metal Storm.
I knew this was a thing. I talked about it in elementary school. The teacher said that would be ridiculous. Said I need to quit making things up. Who's ridiculous now. Fifty years I knew I was right. Thank you Ian . Your the best.
I know I'm not the only one but the mental image of the crew of the Constitution raining down fire on a British ship from the mast with one or two of those beautiful monstrosities makes me happy
I can certainly see where these were absolutely terrifying to the enemy when they worked.
Did he just say the Dutch weren't interested LMAO, the Dutch recreated the weapon under the alias of espingol made by the Dutch rocket unit after the bombardment of Copenhagen and eventually you got the gun with 1 or more barrels firing 1 round at a time several rounds deep and reloaded by a slate pretty quickly. This had generally a 1 barrel version, 3 barrel version or a naval version which looks like a more advance version of the chambers volley. Then you had the Venetian machine gun the famous gun that has very little information on.
The coolest part is that unlinke some of the other old too-far-outside-the-box novelties, it actually saw action.
Ian you have covered many very cool guns, this one has to be in the top three! Very interesting piece of history.
Great video. I never heard of this thing. This is a really fascinating piece of history. The Navy should get a couple of replicas to mount on the USS Constitution so that people can see this forgotten weapon..
I can't even begin to imagine how long this thing takes to reload. 20 minutes? Half an hour?
More like begin after breakfast, finish up after dessert
Probably about 40 or so minutes. We gotta remember they have to line and measure everything so that it is as perfect as possible for the whole thing to function.
Longer, hours.... remember you have to get EVERY round in exactly the right position, so you'd load pretty slowly. Id say at least 30 seconds per round. I reckon hour and a half, to 2 hours.
They probably had powder horns specifically for this that had measuring cups, and those notches in the ramrod probably had a wooden rider that would help ensure you did not overconpress the powder.
This is one of the most truly innovative designs I've ever seen, Really out of the box thinking, and a completely different concept. Definition of Yankee ingenuity. Wow.
Amazing conception! Great video
In case you wanna kill something even deader
LOL
Really great video Ian. I have never heard of this thing in my life and the fact that it's wrapped up in American lore of the founding fathers and Constitution, what a great story.
Guy named Chambers designed a machine gun. Who'd of thunk it? Great video! And what an amazing idea from another great Pennsylvanian!!
Really enjoyed this video Ian, you’re only becoming a better and more engaging presenter over the years. Great lighting!
For when they say "2A was talking about muskets not 'assault rifles'"
That's definitely a "hold my ale" contraption
Thanks Ian. This was an interesting piece of history. I really enjoyed the video sir.
We need a Forgotten Weapons playlist of "flintlock repeating guns". There appear to be surprisingly numerous and varried designs.
The short version could be the one the Dutch had after the Kaboom.
Well,we are getting warmer, i still hope you will cover Peiper Volley Rifle.
Super neat! Thanks for sharing Ian, we appreciate it!!
It's actually dual-purpose. It can provide both a base of fire and - after a few rounds - a handy smokescreen with which to cover the advance of an entire armada.
Very cool, thanks for showing us this. But I think there's a problem with the math. 224 rounds @ 120 rounds/minute = 2(ish) minutes assumes the barrels are fired serially, i.e., barrel #1 finishes before barrel #2 starts, etc. But the flash holes seem to indicate that the barrels fire essentially in parallel. That being the case, the weapon would finish in about 15 seconds, given the rate of fire. Nonetheless, a huge number of rounds going down range.
Based on experience packing a flintlock pan too full and getting a hangfire, there would be perhaps one-half to one second time lag between barrel 1 and barrels 2-4 commencing firing, then same with 5-7. Time to empty would be the sequence in one barrel, plus maybe 2 seconds.
I was thinking this exact thing. Just a couple seconds delay between all the barrels starting their sequence. Still, very impressive
It would fire in volleys of 7 rounds every 3-4 seconds. Thus the 2 minutes.