Post by bazooka on Dec 5, 2020 7:45:55 GMT
The revolver design requires clearance between the cylinder and the barrel, known as the “cylinder gap”. This gap is made as small as possible, but it simply cannot be a tight fit (and even if it is, it won’t be so for long, as mechanical wear will widen the gap).
When a bullet is fired, high-pressure gases escape out of that gap:
This jet of high-pressure, high-temperature gas is like a cutting torch; people holding a revolver as shown in the above image have been known to lose a thumb if it’s placed too far forward.
Now, you’re going to stick your forearm out along a rifle-size revolver to grab the foregrip? Yeah, I’ll pass on that, thanks.
That gap creates a second problem; pretty much from the moment the bullet exits the cylinder, you’re losing gas pressure. That means a longer barrel, built to contain the pressure and increase the acceleration and thus the muzzle energy of the bullet, will actually fairly quickly decrease muzzle energy, as the friction of the bullet along the rifling overcomes the rapidly diminishing force of the gas pressure behind the bullet. So, the much larger and heavier rifle actually won’t get you proportionally more muzzle energy. The only real advantage of the longer length is more accurate sighting.
And lastly, when the revolver was the most common repeating-action weapon before the advent of cartridge ammunition, revolvers often had a nasty habit of setting off more than one charge hole at a time. The ultimate solution was the brass-cased cartridge and eventually smokeless powder, allowing a relatively even-grained fast-burning powder to be contained within the cartridge, reducing flying sparks. But at the time when revolvers were cutting edge, this was a real problem, and it gave you a second, really good reason not to want a hand in front of the cylinder. By the time the ammunition problems were satisfactorily solved just after American Reconstruction (the American Civil War being the last one the country fought primarily with muzzle-loaders), the lever-action carbine was in fairly wide use, followed by the rotating-lock mechanism that enabled bolt-action and ultimately semi-automatic rifle operating mechanisms with cartridge energies beyond the capabilities of the basic revolver design.
When a bullet is fired, high-pressure gases escape out of that gap:
This jet of high-pressure, high-temperature gas is like a cutting torch; people holding a revolver as shown in the above image have been known to lose a thumb if it’s placed too far forward.
That gap creates a second problem; pretty much from the moment the bullet exits the cylinder, you’re losing gas pressure. That means a longer barrel, built to contain the pressure and increase the acceleration and thus the muzzle energy of the bullet, will actually fairly quickly decrease muzzle energy, as the friction of the bullet along the rifling overcomes the rapidly diminishing force of the gas pressure behind the bullet. So, the much larger and heavier rifle actually won’t get you proportionally more muzzle energy. The only real advantage of the longer length is more accurate sighting.
And lastly, when the revolver was the most common repeating-action weapon before the advent of cartridge ammunition, revolvers often had a nasty habit of setting off more than one charge hole at a time. The ultimate solution was the brass-cased cartridge and eventually smokeless powder, allowing a relatively even-grained fast-burning powder to be contained within the cartridge, reducing flying sparks. But at the time when revolvers were cutting edge, this was a real problem, and it gave you a second, really good reason not to want a hand in front of the cylinder. By the time the ammunition problems were satisfactorily solved just after American Reconstruction (the American Civil War being the last one the country fought primarily with muzzle-loaders), the lever-action carbine was in fairly wide use, followed by the rotating-lock mechanism that enabled bolt-action and ultimately semi-automatic rifle operating mechanisms with cartridge energies beyond the capabilities of the basic revolver design.