A Lorenzoni-Girandoni Repeating Pistol - Part 2 

I don't know about exciting, but I have been re-doing this pistol and trying to adapt the mechanism for a rifle.

@@Paul-bk9dh Unfortunately, various events (health,etc) have sidelined things for a bit. I did re-design the frame so it could be produced on a 3-D printer, and the ignition coil was replaced with a commercial EG&G trigger coil (from eBay). These changes didn't make it shoot any better, but made it easier to make one. I played with a few rifle designs but was unsatisfied with the results. I was also looking into how to re-design the receiver to minimize any machining and use printed parts for these too.

Could you do something like this? I love your channel and I think it would be a cool project. It's a shame that nobody else is doing this.

@@stephenwardlaw6428 Is that the version on your website? I absolutely love the design of this pistol (great work by the way!), and I love the Lorenzoni style too so this would be a magnificent piece to make someday. The newest file I could find of it says 2013 and looks like the one in the video, but if more of it could be printed that would be awesome. I'm also glad you mentioned the problem of the conventional rotating cylinder style because I had half of one mocked up in CAD (flip flopped almost like yours with the powder and balls in front so I could have it as a pistol or SBR with collapsible stock and was trying to do a short throw lever action design and potentially updating it to a helical magazine spiraling around the barrel for higher capacities), but I stopped when I realized the taser unit I was planning to use wouldn't work but didn't even think about plasma arc ignitors or what you were using on another one of your videos so I'm glad I stumbled across that. If you have the newer files or prototype model uploaded somewhere please let me know, this is way too cool of a project to let disappear like smoke, its very brilliant and well thought out. Great work!

@@jakegarrett8109 In looking at the site again, I see it really needs updating; I am now on version 4 or 5... The newest version uses pretty much the same receiver, but the body/grip was re-designed for a filament 3-D printer, and the hand-wound ignition coil was replaced by a commercial version. I will put this on my 'list' and post a comment here when it's done.

My Man 3 years later, I think it make sense to move the barrel lower like a bottom fire revolver so that the shuttle won't pop over the sight line. edit: I found something similar ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ndoS_rbM374.html

Very close!

I did a number of engineering calculations using heated air, water steam and alcohol 'steam', and the electrical energy storage required is impractical to do it this way. If one wanted to carry a backpack of capacitors, then that might work, but there is nothing than can beat the stored energy of chemical reactions. I have also looked looked at heat storage systems (superheated steam, etc), but this would be more complicated and much less reliable. If I find a way to do this, rest assured I will put it up for all to see.

@@stephenwardlaw6428 Thanks a lot for your answer, sir.

this gun is no good.imagine that the fire from the chamber can access the propellant tube and ignite the gun become a bomb!!!!!!This pistol is out of firearm safety design.i had made and shoot many time my laser ignite pistol,it ignite very fast but the laser need to be focus perfectly.i could have nicer one if i had an expensive 500wm laser.However,i can even make gun more simple using lighter and armstrong mixture if you understand what i'm talking about.

@@Mr.nine9527 I don't think you'd need 5w laser, even the cheap $50 handheld laser "not pointer" I got was able to set a T-shirt on fire pretty fast (also great for killing spiders from accross the room). I have made a 5w compact laser pistol but its quite terrifying. Now the good thing is that even the 7w laser cutter I added to my 3d printer (to engrave aluminum like iphones, or cut wood etc) is not all that expensive and I paid less than $100 for it (you'll also need a 3s LiPo battery, and that's it) so that wouldn't be a big deal, but I don't think you need that much power. Besides, if you don't mind a little delay you could just ignite a piece of fabric as a primer with the cheap handheld laser I was using for setting shirts on fire with. Or you could just use a piece of wood in the powder since it will catch the wood part of a match stick on fire (you don't need to laser the head, just do any spot of the wood).

The insulator is 'zirconium toughened alumina' (TZA) or 'ceramic steel'. It has a compression strength in excess of 250,000 psi and a substantial shear strength as well. Details of a similar igniter construction can be seen on my rifle project's web page tinyurl.com/plink-king

I designed a rifle using the same principles and will eventually publish it as well. Currently, I am making a (reloadable) .22 'Wildcat' cartridge from a .25 ACP which will be used in a 10-22 format rifle, and I will probably finish that first.

1. I considered using it, and even attaching it to a projectile as a 'unified' ammunition. However, the nuisance of making the ammunition obviates the simplicity of this concept. 2. The instructions and design information is available on the website...

Thanks for the reply AWESOME GUN

Yes, also referred to here as a 'Theremin'.

It was indeed made for short range (25-40 yds) target shooting. With what is essentially a 20gr round ball, the velocity drops off to insignificance in 200 yards, so it is relatively safe to shoot outside. However, at close range it will punch through 3/4" plywood, so it could be lethal with a well-placed shot. I have run over 3000 rounds through it, and it is a lot of fun to shoot (and cheap).

Jake, email me so I can send some stuff to you directly. webmaster@ctmuzzleloaders.com

@@stephenwardlaw6428 Awesome, I just sent you an email, thanks Stephen I think this is such a cool project, looking forward to it!

@@jakegarrett8109 Jake, Please send it again, that mailbox was frozen. I just cleared it.

Sometimes a ball gets hung up and it takes a good whack to unstick it, so a motor drive would have to be very rugged, and that would complicate things. One of my major goals was to keep things simple.

+Dave Smith For use with smokeless powder, in the absence of a vigorous primer, it is necessary for a lot of pressure to build up in order to get efficient powder burning. As the .24 ball is swaged through the barrel, the pressure (and heat) generated ignites the bulk of the powder, while an exact-fitting ball just 'poofs' out of the barrel. Black powder does not need this, but barrel fouling ruins accuracy after a few shots.

+mlshooter That makes sense. I went through your articles on your website and you have done some very impressive work! I have some designs drawn out for a repeater that hopefully will serve as a nice ruger 10/22 replacement. Previously I have experimented with making cartridges consisting of nitrocellulose slowed down with diphenalanine and a lead projectile embedded inside. It worked conceptually, but it was very weak (probably because the burn rate was not tuned) and very slow and somewhat costly to make ammunition for. In that design, I used a sort of sliding collar that reciprocated over the barrel and acted as the chamber. This allowed the rifle to "clean" it's chamber as the rifle was fired. Hopefully I can incorporate such a design into yours. The problem is getting enough time to get around to machining the parts.

Pierre LeDouche Wait, that means railguns are legal? The law has to be altered soon,

곰돌슨 no it doesn't.....

there is only one law that counts "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." any laws infringing on that are therefore obviously unconstitutional

Erik Van der Zee yep you're totally right. And as for the exacting facts of the Second Amendment, I should be able to go by an A-10 Warthog, if I could afford it, but we have become governed by political correctness, and whatever is popular and sensational. If one was to connect a generator to the bodies of the forefathers we would be in no need of electrical power

They’re guns but not considered a firearm by the federal firearms act since it has no casings.

+Lukas Helmers Yes - see the web page for more information.

+mlshooter I thought it looked like SLS, thanks for the reply! The machine operators skill effects the final products quality quite a bit just like with other manufacturing methods.

Lukas Helmers NJ

+Billy Crum As long as the gun is not fully automatic (i.e. "more than one ignition/shot per trigger pull") and you aren't selling them commercially, you can legally make just about anything you want, no problem. That's why there's a market in (and controversy about) so-called "80%" AR 15 lower receivers - that's the part that is legally a "firearm", yet the as-sold form factor cannot fire anything. Legally, it's just a chunk of metal; you have to do the finishing machining yourself. But it's the same principal. Also why you will likely never be able to purchase this. But maybe he can provide some CNC files? ;-) (Edit - I should add this is legal from a Federal perspective only; YMMV depending on the state and locality you reside in. As always, check your local laws.)

+Billy Crum it doesn't use fixed ammo so the ATF doesn't recognise it as a gun

There should be a set of STEP files on the pistol's website: tinyurl.com/lg-pistol

+baarni A piezo igniter does not deliver enough energy to ignite even black powder - much less smokeless powder. See video ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Nm6PEdBcQ6s.html

mlshooter Ok cool, Thanks for the clarification.

+DJJAW11 Probably not. I'm not sure you can even buy loose powder in the UK these days.

+MrJest2 Pretty sure you can, actually. Think medieval reenactment etc. All you need for the uk is some sort of police authorisation that you can have/store black powder. They may want to know your intended purpose, tho ;-) no blowing up the house of lords =D

Smokeless powder cannot be ignited by a chamber flash-over, its ignition energy requirement is too high. Also, there is a dynamic seal as described which prevents all but the tiniest gas leakage from the chamber. The powder chamber has a soft blow-out just in case everything else went wrong. However, this design could not be safely used with black powder.

@@stephenwardlaw6428 yep but the risk is still available,

@@stephenwardlaw6428 the gun can be better with revolver design and the cylinder can be rotated by a motor or trigger mechanism.