[Bill Akins]

Stephanie B wrote:
It'd be ugly, but if you used a piston driving a small rotating wheel, with the gun's mechanism being operating by a connecting rod coming off the wheel, you could align the piston in almost any direction. That way, if the thing were to come apart, it would blow away from the shooter.

Good point Stephanie. If the gas were tapped to say a vertically reciprocating piston (not reciprocating horizontally in line with the shooters face) and that piston turned a wheel that operated the mechanism to cock the hammer, then as you said, if the system came apart nothing would fly to the rear into the shooter's face. I like how you think Stephanie. Although not exactly the same (because I hadn't envisioned a vertical piston), that's kind of similar to what I was thinking of earlier with using a toggle/locomotive train wheel that the piston would turn and would redirect that piston's force and travel back forward again. But Akumabito's latest self adjusting gas pressure valve may obviate the necessity for a complicated linkage like that. But as you said, no matter if it looked ugly, it could still work.

Stephanie B quoted Bill Akins who wrote:
the operation of a steam locomotive's strut and wheels and how when the straight strut went back it turned the wheel a certain distance, then the inertia and counterweight on the wheel made it go the rest of the way around the circle.

Stephanie B wrote:
Well, not exactly. Those pistons were double-acting, so they had power strokes in both directions of travel. The action of the piston on the other side of the locomotive was offset by 90 degrees, so that when the piston on one side was at either end of its travel, the other one was midway. (Three-cylinder locomotives had their piston-actions offset by 60 degrees.)
Anyway, you probably knew all that, but other folks might not have.

A good thing to mention for folks Stephanie. I did know that, but I just mentioned the flywheel part of it only to avoid describing how the whole locomotive wheel worked. Which is a deviation from my usual writing a book on every little detail Lol! I did know that the opposite side of the trains wheel strut was located so that as the other side's wheel reached the limit of its travel, the other strut had not and so it helped carry the other opposing wheel past its strut's end of travel binding point.

The flywheel helped to balance out that difference between the strut difference in travel in relation to each other between the opposing wheels, although the counterweight on the wheels does aid via inertia in helping the wheels to get past their end of strut travel "binding" point.

As you mentioned, the train wheel's struts have a power stroke both forward and rearward. Even though it could still operate with just a power stroke in one direction, (just with less power), because even if it only had a power stroke in one direction, the opposing wheel's strut being offset from the other wheel, would always carry the other wheel's strut past its point of wanting to bind at the end of its travel.

I have always been fascinated by how the locomotive wheel works. It has so many possibilities in other applications. When the strut of one train wheel reaches the limit of its forward travel, it has to have something get it rotated just a little past that point so it won't bind, to where the strut can now travel to the rear. So if opposing train wheel struts were timed to where as one reached the limit of its forward travel, and the opposing wheel had just reached the limit of its rearward travel, they would both bind up and not turn. Because neither wheel would be helping the other ones strut to continue past its binding point. So the opposing wheel's struts have to be offset enough from each other so that each opposing wheel and strut helps the other opposing wheel and strut past its end of travel "binding" point.

I've built three prototypes of air and water cooled (truly working water cooled barrel) dress up kits for the Ruger 10/22 that resemble the Maxim and Browning medium machine guns. I use several different brands of crank fire trigger activators on them. You turn the crank just like a pencil sharpener crank (or Gatling gun crank) and that causes a cam to actuate a strut to poke out and function the trigger as the crank is turned. Most of the time 4 times per crank revolution, but there are some cranks that do it 6 and 8 times per crank revolution. Anyway....

I experimented with making offset strut locomotive wheels that I attached to the spindle of the crankfire device in place of the crank handle. I plan to make a mini thimble thumb crank located between the spade grips so that I can literally crank the system to fire (using my two thumbs) as I hold onto the spade grips and the locomotive struts and wheels turn the spindle to function the trigger. That way I can keep both hands on the spade grips while still crank firing the gun. As can be seen in this below video I made of me experimenting with that. If you watch carefully, you can see where as one strut reaches its forward limit of its travel rotating one wheel, the other sides strut is offset so that it hasn't reached its forward limit yet, and thus continues to turn the spindle and that gets the other wheel's strut past its binding point. Thus each wheel always helps the other wheel past any forward or rear travel strut bind point.

I could use more wheels and struts connected together or a mini bicycle type chain/sprocket linkage, a belt, or even gears to connect the locomotive wheels to get to my mini thumb crank between the spade grips. I don't have the mini thumb crank for between the spade grips fabricated yet, but you can still see the basic idea of it working by my just working the struts.......

http://good-times.webshots.com/video...99763970ivXHkP

And another video with me putting the crank handle back on one side of the crank fire trigger activator's spindle, and then putting just one locomotive style wheel on the other side....seeking to use what is now wasted movement of the other side of the spindle to power another operation......

http://good-times.webshots.com/video...99763970qFLrCs

I just wanted to share that, to show how a locomotive train wheel and strut has applications to not only power a system by a piston reciprocating in virtually any direction and it doesn't matter to the wheel it turns whether the piston is vertical or horizontal just as you suggested and pointed out Stephanie, but to also show how the locomotive strut and wheel can redirect a piston's rearward force back forward again, and vice versa. As well as how just a single locomotive wheel on the opposite side of a spindle that is already being rotated by a source that does not require offset wheel struts, can allow that single locomotive type wheel to operate another function and therefore not waste that motion that is already being used anyway.

I still like the locomotive wheel/toggle linkage concept for redirecting the piston's force and direction. But Akumabito has shown a really good system for an adjustable gas amount valve, that once the plug is screwed in to a certain point, will self adjust to where no matter how much gas comes to the valve, it will only allow just so much gas to pass and the rest of the gas is vented outside the gas tube. I have to admit that is a much less bulky and less complicated system than locomotive wheels/toggle linkages.

But still, after reading your post Stephanie and continuing to think about locomotive wheels, allow me to indulge in a bit of fanciful thinking, which although fanciful and cumbersome, would still work.....

Visualize a gas trap over the end of the barrel on the 1858 Remington revolver. Now visualize TWO short gas tube chambers attached vertically from that gas trap powering two separate pistons vertically and which turn two separate wheels at the upper front area of the barrel (your front sight would be BETWEEN the two wheels). Now visualize two offset struts going rearward from those two front of barrel locomotive wheels at the gas trap, going to and connecting to two more locomotive wheels that are located over the hammer at the rear of the revolver. When the shot fired, gas would go into the gas trap, then go to TWO short vertical gas tubes, powering TWO pistons, which would turn TWO locomotive wheels, which would have TWO offset struts going to the rear to another set of TWO locomotive wheels attached over the top of the hammer. Then a cam on the spindle connecting those two over the hammer locomotive wheels would cock the hammer as the wheels rotated!

We could even use Akumabito's latest pressure limiting relief valve and hook that up to a little steam whistle so that excess steam...er...gas from the valve, would toot the whistle! The steam whistle could even be the front sight. Then shout "All aboard!" just before we fired. Lol! We could even put a little cow catcher on the front of the gas trap to aid in protecting the front vertical gas tubes/wheels and struts when they were funneled into a monster of a holster!

With it having four wheels on top in line with each other, if we made it full auto and tied the trigger back, we could even turn it upside down, put it on the ground, pull the hammer and release it, and it would roll along on its own for six shots like a kid's toy train shooting and tooting! Lol! You know...."It's for the children". The anti-gunners would love that. Laughing so hard I think I hurt myself!

Hilarious though it sounds....it would work!

But anyone even contemplating building such a six shot, semi-auto, muzzleloading revolver of mass destruction should be immediately sent to a re-education camp, forced to wear pink and listen to Yoko Lennon songs and with toothpicks holding their eyelids open like in "A clockwork Orange" forced to repeatedly watch Rebecca Peters re-education videos extolling the horrors of guns in the hands of anyone other than the police of the new world order funded by George Soros, until they "got their mind right" like Paul Newman in "Cool hand Luke".

But seriously, Baronet Sir George Cayley built, and perhaps flew, using internal and external combustion gunpowder-fueled model aircraft engines in 1807, 1819 and 1850. That's a true fact. So don't laugh, okay go ahead and laugh Lol.

Or we could do away with the front wheels, and just have copper tubing running back on both sides of the barrel, bringing the gas from the gas trap, back to the rear, to two separate vertical gas tubes/pistons connected to two wheels over the hammer that have a cam on the wheel spindle to cock the hammer. Hmmm, that would actually look kinda cool and be a lot less cumbersome at the front of the barrel than a four wheeled version. I actually kind of like that idea. Instead of one long piston traveling to the rear, (in line with a persons eye), instead gas traveling rearward in copper tubes from the front of barrel gas trap, would power two small vertical pistons in small short gas tubes either over the hammer, or to each side of the hammer. Then those pistons would turn two small locomotive style wheels located over the top of the hammer. And a cam on the spindle of the wheels would cock the hammer. Every time you fired, the two pistons attached to struts would move up and down and rotate the wheels which would turn and the cam on the wheel's spindle would cock the hammer.

It would not only be a "Steampunk" gas operated, semi-auto muzzleloading revolver....It would be a "Steam LOCOMOTIVE punk" gas operated, semi-auto muzzleloading revolver. The ULTIMATE "steampunk" weapon if ever there was one. LOL!!!

Okay, the aliens are coming anytime now to kidnap me for this new steampunk gun technology I just revealed!

Sorry, just had to indulge in that. But seriously, the principle is sound and it could be built and actually work! That's the hilariously funny thing about it!

Okay, I've stopped laughing at my own fanciful silliness now. Back to discussing the best design for this muzzleloading semi-auto revolver.

Can't wait to see what Akumabito's latest rendering will be, based on mine and his last posts regarding his pressure limiting spring valve concept, and the system speed concerns I listed in my last post.

And I appreciate you Stephanie B, Jo6pak, Blue Train, Akumabito, and all the other members who have participated thus far in this thread. It's been and continues to be a fun discussion into possibilities. Hopefully it will lead to some interesting prototypes.


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