Little Tom: the World's First DAO Automatic 

Ian ! Thank you very much, you solved a mystery for me. When I was a little boy in Germany on a Bauernhof (farm) I found one of those in a cottage for workers... Wrapped in greased news paper from 1943! Had a full magazine, 6 rounds I think (I was 11). I only remember that it was marked 6.35 mm. It had WWF on both grips. Shot all the rounds out of it before my Father came, kicked me up the Bum and confiscated it :D. He never told me what happened to it, so I just ask my Mother and it was taken by Customs in 1983 when we emigrated to Australia.

Wow, that's one hell of a simple DA mechanism and I think it's genius!

I love the way he made the barrel so easy to take out!

Pretty amazing how much interesting stuff there is to see on something as straightforward as a blowback .25 pocket pistol.

So cool! I love turn-of-the-century automatics. There were so many fresh and innovative features that were tried, the guns always interesting

As a youngster I had a couple of them in Austria. Some have been made at Wiener Waffenfabrik and some at the Ferlacher Buchsenmacher Gesellschaft.

You sure are getting good at spotting the strange and unique specimens! I never considered the thought of a double action pistol having two sear points like this one does.

I don't think you need to worry about being nerdy on this channel, Ian. That's why we like it! ...or that's at least why I like it :p

Is that a Little Tom in your pants? No,it's a PP.

That's one of the more elegant mechanisms I've seen, and a truly fine-looking mouse gun. I'll find one for my own collection someday.

Something of the kid in me just loves mouse guns. Thank you great video. Hard to explain, guts of the gun so well. You get it.

I came here because the “Little Tom” pistol is a pivotal plot point in the novel “The Pale Criminal” by Philip Kerr. I wanted to know more about it. (The story is set in Berlin in 1938.)

That magazine loading style might be kinda dumb, but you have to admit there's a certain charm to the idea.

"Wiener Waffenfabrik" literally just means "viennese weapons factory" greatings from vienna! :)

Fascinating Mechanisms! Thank You GunGuru Ian!

I love your videos so much. Guns and history are my two favorite things. I hope you do a video on the K2 sometime in the future.

I like this design. It's really original at this point in SA pistol development, and it's also very simple. Thanks for the vid!

truly genius! you can tell this person knew what they were doing.

That's really a surprisingly clever yet simple system. It doesn't look like it would be that comfortable to shoot, and I'm not so sure about having a loose magazine or a barrel that easily dislodged, but for light self defense, i would totally buy that.

Interesting little pistol. I always thought Le Francais was the first DAO pistol. This came out in 1909, 3 years before Le Francais. Fascinating.

I never thought I'd see a gun where you engage the safety by pulling the trigger.

IMHO after watching a lot vids here this is the best pistol design of that era. Sleek and functional, outside and inside. When it was made, .25/.32 were the calibers of choice, as concealed-carry pistols were intended for really short distances only. .380/9mm and the widespread use of medium distance pistols came decades later.

Interesting guns!Thanks Ian!Unfortunately almost impossible to buy here in Finland..Too small,would be categorized as "pocket gun" here..

I love these early solutions people came up with for triggers

Wow, that's one real piece of engineering.

I love the simplicity of the trigger mechanism.

Interesting design elements on these little pistols I haven't heard of before

I really enjoy your presentations. Would uyou consider including estimated values of the guns you discuss in various conditions?

Incredible timing, Ian. TFB TV just did a video on this little guy.

I now know (well, noticed) that's a Hall rifle third from the right. Thanks Ian!

Fascinating, that mag and trigger action! Were the sights taken off by a previous owner or did these guns come without sights from the factory?

I love this little pistol. The top loading/ejecting magazine well is a novel idea.

This is a significant step toward the modern carry gun. One can see the influence of this first DA pocket gun in almost all of the popular pocket semi-autos today. The trigger-hammer link is very similar to SCCY,Kel-tec,LCR and such. Well I suppose there are only so many ways to execute a DA pistol but the Little Tom was first. Alex C reviewed a Czech made Little Tom .I wonder if the Czech made ones are different in that it will only load the mag from the topside , at about 1:30 ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SgNJvoX6wM0.html Thanks Ian.

Such an impressive design for such an early design. Kinda funny how a lot of older guns are more complicated than modern designs (and didn't even have added safeties). Many were just over-thinking the designs when they invented them (like the 1911).

What a neat little gun.

I think that mag through the top is genius as hell, in the middle of a gun fight or confrontation with somebody else, which would be faster, having to hit the release at the bottom and pull the mag out, put it down, pick up the next one, slide it in OR you just push the new mag into the gun and let the old one fall to the ground through the top and keep shooting. Guns are designed to be used in violent situation, gun makers dont make guns for people to carry around in a holster and never use. The only purpose of a gun is survival by force (hunting or defending ones self) ,and any design in the gun that helps that is good. There isnt one situation besides just being at the range where that feature in the gun wouldnt be possibly useful. IF someone knows there way around a gun even a little bit theyd be able to effectively use that feature in one situation or another if needed. The specific design of the mag system might need to be fiddled with which wont happen because as you said "no one does that anymore" but the idea of that is fucking genius. technically no gun feature is needed beside a working pin, mag (or cylinder), slide and extractor. EVERYTHING else on a gun is just shit that the designer decided would help or set the gun apart from competitors. you could say the same thing about the mag fed revolver, the design of how it feeds trounds is not "practical" but the dude made it that way anyway, why? to set the gun apart from its competitors. OKay, thats my rant for today about something completely not important

Very ilustractive.

My God is that an adorable sidearm, gimme!

excellent to see how the trigger mechanism works on these pistols

welp, that's ingenious. if I go and make myself a semi-auto, I think I'll just use that trigger design. looks pretty easy to make. What stops the barrel from moving on it's own, though? the safety being off?

My understanding is that double action means pulling the trigger is doing two things, drawing back the hammer or striker and then releasing it, and that single action means is doing one thing, releasing the hammer or striker. Since even though this pistol has the same length of travel for shooting it with the hammer cocked back, the trigger is only doing one thing, I think it should still be considered a DA/SA.

Such a cute little barrel :D

Do you only review guns coming up for auction? This gun reminds me of another interesting Czechoslovakian DOA 25cal pistol, the Vzor 45 or CZ45 designed by Jan Kratochvil (?) Another pistol/rifle I'd like to see you review is the French Unique Duo (as opposed to the Czechoslovakian Duo), which used the same action on both a pistol barrel and rifle barrel, which seems to me to be a rather good idea! Last question; as an Australian collector of these European pocket/vest pocket pistols; is it possible to export these collectible to an auction company in USA like RIA, or is American import of these as "Curios and Relics" totally banned? p.s. Keep up the good work! Your channel is by far the best and most informative site on the internet. Many thanks!

It's a clever design.

Good video and interesting as always.

That's the problem with being first, you are forced to answer a bunch of questions that nobody has had the opportunity to ask yet. The designer of this gun did an impressive job.

thanks for the education its a brilliant vidio

Best one ...i loved it

Good gun Mr .

Czech firearms designers don't get enough credit.

Interesting barrel lock design. What keeps it from coming out/sliding back as it cycles?

What keeps the barrel from moving back when the slide goes back after firing? Or does the slide come forwards fast enough to slam it back into place.

very cool the way you can load her

He may have made some prior to WW1 or near the beginning of the conflict because I have a little Tom dated 1915 with a SR of 1571. I think there is a level of chaos thrown into this history due to the war that makes it unclear.

TFB TV did a video on the Little Tom recently as well and in his video he states that the magazine will not load properly from under the grip. Is there a reason for this discrepancy?

A nice looking pair of mouse guns. It'll be interesting to see how much they fetch at auction.

you never explained why no other guns allow for a magazine to come out of the gun as you place a new one in.

TFB TV did a shooting review on what I think is the a DA/SA variant

Interesting, and old vid, but 3 thoughts.... 1. No sights 2. With that barrel attachment wouldn't hand cycling the action with a sticky case pull the barrel off? 3. Why is the push through magazine a bad idea?

Outstanding as always. Why do the Czechs have such strengths in weapon design? in addition to the well-known firearms, didn't Skoda also produce some very handy pack howitzers? I think they were mentioned in Lawrence of Arabia's writings.

Hello do you know what originally was the magazine that was modified? (4 min 25 in the video) Thank you

Very cool

Ian, was Alex mistaken on TFB Channel when he stated that the Little Tom's magazine can only be loaded from the top or is that specific to the model of which he just posted a video?

Just because the trigger goes the same distance doesn't make it double action only. It is still in single action mode if the hammer is cocked. The triger is still only doing a SINGLE ACTION, droping the hammer. If the hammer couldn't be cocked, it would be double action only.

I'm kinda curious, wouldn't that trigger bar be a sort of weakpoint in longer term use? It looks raher thin.

awesome

Is this gun actually a DAO? As the gun can be in a full cocked position, is that not actually a DA/SA? It was not demonstrated that after a shot had been fired and the action had cycled, that the hammer was still against the firing pin, but even at that...I thought that by definition, a DAO does not have any provision for having the hammer in full cocked position...or am I wrong?

So the magazine is like an en-bloc clip and standard magazine? I know it seems like a pointless feature but man I would like having that feature for just the sheer option of slamming a new mag in there without having to manually drop the first one ^-^

Since the trigger return spring is also the recoil spring, wouldn't the trigger hit your finger back when the slide moves back from recoil? (i.e. the recoil spring is suddenly compressed)

The magazine idea reminds me ever so slightly of Mannlicher en-bloc feeding

3:46 Confused screaming

Shoutout to everyone in the forgotten weapons comments community.

A DAO pistol wihich for single shots can be fired as a single action. You have to pull the trigger all the way, yes, but without the force needed to cock the hammer. Weird stuff, but I like it!

Anyone else think the trigger bar assy is simple and classy? Don't let Royal Nonesuch see it!

TFB TV did a video with the one of those like 5 days ago. Funny I did say it should be on your channel =P. Edit: Seems TFB TV got some details wrong or something.

So, this is the first double action only semi-auto pistol, but what's the first double action semi-auto pistol?

My mistake, barrel was stuck.

would love for you to get your hands on a PSM

Well ... I am not Czech (I am Slovak which is next closest :-)) but Tomiska does not translate to anything related to Tom. Also Tom is not used in our parts, the full name is Tomas (Tomash would be about the correct pronunciation). Tomiska has no meaning that I am aware of.

Might have sold more of them if he put sights on them.

They look interesting..... are they working firearms? Wonder how they shoot

How does the safety works ?

I want to purchase good condition auction sell, because I have already applied for gun license, may I know price of equation of Indian money

Sooooo what keeps the barrel from recoiling backward when you fire the gun?

with that logo someone might think it was somehow related to the World Wrestling Federation

Hey cool. I'm getting Tom and Jerry episodes at my side.

I'm a bit of a newbie when it comes to firearm operating mechanisms so can someone explain me why I would want to cock the hammer with a trigger mechanism like on this gun? I don't see the point. To me it seems like the gun will fire no matter the position of the hammer!

interesting trigger

6.35 isn't it about the diameter of a BB pellet?

Does the Little Tom malfunction frequently?

But you have shown there is a single action there :P

I reckon its SA/DA, not DAO, right?

Looks like a Seecamp.

i would've bought it

the gun Wonder Woman carries

Holy crap, these are REALLY rare.

Pretty interesting concept for the magazine- it gets around the awkwardness of the heel release at least. Pretty nonsensical for a dinky pocket pistol like that though- if you´re carrying this then you don´t expect more than one or two crooks to assault you, and you don´t expect to dump a whole mag for it. So why you would need a fast reload system for this i dunno.

I find it funny that these weapons don't have any sights. Must have been point blank range self defense guns only.

We’re these pistols sanctioned by the WWF? That is what’s on the grips lol.

nutnfancy ould like this, also super tactical clip reload M1 Garand style (manual version).