Schwarzlose 1901 Toggle-Delayed Prototype
Semiauto Pistols
•
12m
Andreas Schwarzlose was a German designer who created several very interesting and unusual handgun designs (in addition to his 1907 heavy machine gun, which was adopted as a standard arm of the Austro-Hungarian military). His first handgun was the model 1898, a short recoil, rotating bolt pistol that was remarkably ahead of its time but failed to sell well. This was followed by this experimental toggled locked 1901 prototype design.
The 1901 Schwarzlose is a toggle-delayed blowback system, but not in the same way as the Luger or Pedersen. It has a unique set of arms that provide a major mechanical disadvantage to delay opening when fired, unlike anything else. It also uses a torsion type of mainspring, which is also quite unusual in handgun design. All in all, a fascinating pistol!
When it failed to become commercially successful, Schwarzlose moved on to his 1908 blow-forward pocket pistol, which (remarkably) was the most successful of all his handguns.
Up Next in Semiauto Pistols
-
Sosso 1941 Italian Prototype Pistol
The Model 1941 Sosso is a huge Italian experimental semiauto pistol designed by Giulio Sosso. It uses a short recoil locking mechanism and is chambered for standard 9x19mm Parabellum ammunition, but its more unusual feature is its magazine. Instead of using a traditional spring and follower, the ...
-
Olympic Arms' OA-98 AR Pistol - A Str...
The AR-15 does not lend itself to stock-less use, because its basic design places the recoil spring in the length of the stock, and requires that space for the bolt carrier to travel in. Olympic Arms, however, developed a way to modify the basic AR-15 design to allow for a pistol version that did...
-
Rogak P18 - A Cautionary Tale of Manu...
The Rogak P18 was a copy of the Steyr GB service pistol, with some disagreement over whether it was unlicensed or just unfortunately made. Les Rogak was a Steyr distributor in Illinois who managed to acquire a set of plans for the GB pistol, and put it into production before Steyr-made examples w...
