Yeah...I can SWEAR that I have, somewhere, seen a revolver that does "sort" of what the old Schofield and related guns did, that is, break open...but, up instead of down as they did. Am I entirely out in the realm of fantasy, or...?

...!
Stoke Mandeville, Esq & The Victorian Ballsmiths
"Nobody Want Verdigris-Covered Balls!"

The only "tip-up" revolvers I'm aware of are the S&W Model 1 and it's slightly beefier sibling the Model 1 1/2. And both of those were "belly guns," aka guns of such light caliber that they were only useful if fired at very close range.

>Yeah...I can SWEAR that I have, somewhere, seen a revolver that does
>"sort" of what the old Schofield and related guns did, that is, break
>open...but, up instead of down as they did. Am I entirely out in the
>realm of fantasy, or...?

I can't think of any specific examples beyond the aforementioned S&W Model 1 (and various unlicensed knockoffs of same, the 1860s having been the golden age of unlicensed firearms knockoffs in the United States), but at some point in the mid-1800s, you can be pretty sure that someone somewhere tried whatever you're thinking of. :)

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

LAST EDITED ON Sep-01-17 AT 03:18 PM (EDT)
 
Could be that what has stuck in my mind is a movie invention, since I seem to remember a scene with someone walking and breaking the gun open, shaking the rounds out of it. And it definetly had "normal" rounds in it. (.38 and up, not that the .22 isn't normal, but, well...)

Oh, and another thing that struck me, which doesn't per se have to do with the other, but...does anyone know how the Mateba 6, the so-called "autorevolver" work? The Webley-Fosberry had a long recoil, and grooves in the drum, to work the thing...but the Mateba has neither of those. .5 inch and a smooth drum. So...how?

...!
Stoke Mandeville, Esq & The Victorian Ballsmiths
"Nobody Want Verdigris-Covered Balls!"

LAST EDITED ON Sep-01-17 AT 05:46 PM (EDT)
 
>Oh, and another thing that struck me, which doesn't per se have to do
>with the other, but...does anyone know how the Mateba 6, the so-called
>"autorevolver" work? The Webley-Fosberry had a long recoil, and
>grooves in the drum, to work the thing...but the Mateba has neither of
>those. .5 inch and a smooth drum. So...how?

It is essentially the same as the Webley-Fosbery, but arranged differently. It works on the same "upper assembly recoils on rails, working the cylinder and cocking the hammer" principle, but the system for indexing the cylinder is a hand working on gearteeth at the back (like in a conventional revolver) rather than in big zigzag grooves on the sides. That's also why it doesn't need to recoil as far, because the advancing action is all happening at the back of the cylinder rather than needing to involve slots running the full length of it.

The W-F wasn't the only revolver to have those zigzag grooves; early Mauser revolvers, for instance, had a similar cylinder-advance system. It was just another way of setting up a mechanism to do that job. It's a simpler, easier-to-build mechanism—I've heard of at least one design for a 3D-printed revolver using a zigzag system—and some designers considered it more positive because it involved bigger parts, while others—and history, it seems—concluded that they were too much more susceptible to getting fouled with debris and jamming the works.

--G.
-><-
Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.