Toolroom Prototype Smith & Wesson No.3 Revolver
Prototype & Trials Weapons
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7m 11s
Good inventors are always trying out new solutions to problems. Those solutions may or may not work (hence Thomas Edison’s 10,000 ways not to make a light bulb), but the attempts can often give us interesting insight into the designer’s intentions. In this case, we have a toolroom S&W No3 revolver with a different method of opening in which the action is fits rotated to the side, and then the barrel tipped forward. It is based on US Patent #136348, granted to Daniel Wesson in February of 1873, and in the patent he describes his intention to solve several theoretical shortcomings of the No3 design, both in handling and manufacture.
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