Best Gun - 2

In our previous post, we looked at the term "best gun". As we found in our previous post, this is a term that is used to refer to a high-quality double barreled shotgun with some very specific features in it. Quite a few of these are manufactured by British firms, especially London based ones, but they are not the only ones. W.W. Greener and Westley Richards, both from Birmingham, also manufacture "best guns", as do firms from other countries around the world.

Italy also has some well-known best gun makers, such as Piotti, Fabbrica Armi d'Abbiatico e Savinelli (FAMARS), Beretta, Fabbri, Benelli etc. Their products (and prices) are comparable to some of the finest British firms. These firms are usually located in Northern Italy, which was a traditional firearms manufacturing center for centuries. The town and region of Brescia was known for its fine firearms for at least 500 years and before that, it was a hotbed for production of swords for the Roman legions.

A best gun made by Piotti of Italy. Click on image to enlarge.

A best gun made by Fabbri of Italy. Click on image to enlarge.

The above two examples show the fine work of their manufacturers. The model made by Fabbri sells for over $250,000!

Not to be outdone, we have manufacturers from Spain and Belgium as well. The Spanish city of Eibar in the Basque Country region is a traditional gunmaking town from the middle ages, as is the town of Liege in Belgium. Predictably enough, the well known manufacturers of best guns come from these regions as well. Spanish best gun manufacturers such as Pedro Arrizabalaga, Armas Garbi, Grulla Armas etc. have a good reputation in the market.

A best gun made by Pedro Arrizabalaga. Click on image to enlarge 

A best gun made by Armas Garbi. Click on image to enlarge.

Spanish best guns are generally priced well below their English or Italian counterparts, but they are still very high-quality firearms.

The city of Liege in Belgium was also a traditional hotbed of firearms manufacturing since the 1400s or so. The various manufacturers based around this city used to produce firearms of varying qualities: see our discussion on spurious firearms for some low quality specimens. It has also produced some very high-quality products as well. Most of the manufacturers in and around Liege have gone out of business at the present time, but there are a few small manufacturers still in business and also the 800 lb. gorilla, Fabrique Nationale (FN), which continues to make best guns along with military rifles, pistols, revolvers etc. These guns normally retail for about $15,000- $80,000 or so.

Germany also had a few best gun manufacturers in history, mostly located around the town of Suhl, which (surprise, surprise) has a long history of gunmaking. After World War II, the town of Suhl went to East Germany and thus, the firearms industry in that town went into decline, as the communist government strongly discouraged private arms manufacturers. After German reunification, the town has recovered some of its former glory -- the school of firearms engraving and the Guild of Master Gunsmiths are now both located here. The only major manufacturer still in Suhl is the firm of Merkel, but some of the other well known German manufacturers such as J.P. Sauer & Sohn, Krieghoff etc. moved to West German towns after World War II and are still in business. J.P. Sauer & Sohn, founded in 1751, is well-known for their SIG Sauer line of pistols, but they also manufacture best guns.

German best guns tend to be heavier than their English or Italian counterparts and tend to be very strongly built. They also tend to have deeper engraving. Because their style is different from the "London Best" style followed by British, Italian and Spanish manufacturers, the demand is lower and hence they are lower priced. However, they have very good strength and quality of workmanship.

Finally, we have the United States. At one time, there were many best gun manufacturers in the good ol' USA: Remington, Parker, Winchester, Lefever, Ithaca etc. Most American best guns are heavier than their English, Italian or Spanish counterparts because they are designed to fire stronger American shotgun cartridges. American best guns are generally built for mass production, hence many lack some of the characteristics of the very best British, Italian or Spanish guns. However, the quality of engraving, checkering and finish are excellent on the high-grade guns and are comparable to other best gun products from other manufacturers. There are still manufacturers in the US that are building replica models of some of the finest shotguns made in the last couple of centuries.

Actions: Recoil Action: Inertia Recoil Operation

In the last two actions that we studied previously, the short recoil operated action and the long recoil operated action, the common feature to both is that the bolt and barrel are allowed to recoil, while the rest of the firearm remains immobile. Today we will study another type of recoil action called the Inertia Recoil Operated Action.

In this type of action, unlike the other two types, the bolt is held immobile initially and the rest of the firearm is allowed to recoil around it. This means that the recoiling parts form a greater mass than in the other two types of recoil actions that we studied previously. That implies that this action is suitable to be used by firearms with heavier loads, such as large bore shotguns. The original design for the inertia recoil action was done by Bruno Civolani in 1967. He tried to sell the design to several manufacturers, but was not successful until he approached an Italian firm named Benelli. Until then, Benelli was largely a moped and motorcycle manufacturer, but they were also exploring the business of firearms and they produced their first firearm using this action in 1969. The action became somewhat popular due to its fast rate of fire (about 5 rounds/sec). Since then, Benelli has manufactured a number of shotgun models that use this design and has also licensed the design to a few other manufacturers such as Franchi (Italy) and Stoeger (Turkey). Currently, the Benelli, Franchi and Stoeger brands are now all owned by Beretta S.A. of Italy.

Block diagram of the Inertia Recoil Operated Action. Public domain image.

In the above diagram, at step 1, bolt body A and barrel B are initially locked together and C is the frame of the weapon. The bolt body and barrel are joined together by a inertial spring. After it is fired (step 2), the bolt body A remains stationary while the firearm recoils into the shooter's body. As a result of this, the parts B and C move backwards and compress the inertial spring between A and B. Then in step 3, the inertial spring that was compressed in step 2 begins to expand and push bolt A backwards. At this point, the bolt A is unlocked and allowed to be pushed fully backwards as shown in step 4. The bolt has an extractor that pulls out the old spent cartridge case backwards and ejects it at this stage. The bolt moves backwards fully and compresses a recoil spring (not shown) at the back of the weapon and also re-cocks the weapon. Then in step 5, the recoil spring pushes the bolt forwards again and it picks up a new cartridge and the bolt is locked to the barrel and the cycle begins again.

The reader may be interested in an animated video of the above action, to get a better understanding of how it works.

The inertia operated system is known for its simplicity, since there are only 3 primary parts in the action: the bolt body, inertia spring and rotating bolt head. This also means the weapon is fairly light weight as well. Compared to gas operated actions, this action requires less cleaning since the fired gases do not enter the working mechanism and hence there is no carbon buildup. However, they generally have transmit a bit more recoil to the user than a gas operated system. As mentioned above, this is an extremely fast action compared to a long recoil operated action. It is also very versatile as it is capable of firing various types of cartridges of different firing powers, without re-adjusting the action at all.

As a demonstration of the speed of shooting an inertia action weapon, here's a video of a world class exhibition shooter, Tom Knapp, demonstrating how to shoot 10 clay targets with a single throw. Note that he mentions that his shotgun is a stock off-the-shelf model with only two extra accessories: a magazine extension to hold more rounds (the Benelli shotgun model he is using only holds 3 + 1 rounds without the extension) and his fiber-optic sight.

Benelli, Franchi and Stoeger are all known for their quality shotguns. The Benelli M3 shotgun in particular, is a favored weapon carried by SWAT teams.