Big Iron Challenge

[Kiwi Imperialist]

Welcome to the BIG IRON challenge! The Second World War aircraft carrier challenge has generated some excellent entries, but there are no doubt a few people who have little interest in the subject. This challenge is for those who want something different. Participants are asked to draw a Gunbucket-scale revolver designed at some point between the year Samuel Colt patented his revolving gun (1836) and the year Arizona became a state (1912). The timeframe and title of this challenge may suggest a Wild West theme. While this microcosm of history was indeed the inspiration, entries will not be restricted American revolvers. They may originate from any nation, real or fictitious. The challenge will run in parallel with the Second World War aircraft carrier challenge and close on the same date. As it is meant to be a sort of mini-challenge, only one drawing per participant will be permitted. Please read the challenge rules and requirements. Feel free to ask a question if you are uncertain about any aspect of the challenge.

Design Requirements

1. Your submission must depict a revolver designed between 1836 and 1912.
2. The revolver should be a handgun.
3. Pepper-box revolvers with a set of revolving barrels are excluded.
4. Turret guns, where the chambers rotate about an axis perpendicular to the barrel, are not allowed.
5. A stock is permitted if the stock is a detachable non-permanent addition to the gun, and if the revolver is usable without the stock.

Challenge Rules

1. Each participant must submit one image.
2. The image should be a Shipbucket template modified to include the participant’s art. Templates which include a data sheet are allowed.
3. One right-facing side view of the participant's revolver is permitted in the image.
4. A textual description accompanying each submission is allowed, but not necessary.
5. Off-topic posts will be reported to the relevant authorities.
6. All art should be in gunbucket scale (1 inch = 20 pixels).

This challenge will run until the 15th of August, ending at 23:59 UTC-12 (International Date Line West).
A countdown timer can be found at this link. Alternatively, find out the time and date in your time zone at the bottom of this post.

A poll will be held after this date. Members of the Shipbucket community will have an opportunity to score, on a scale of 1 to 10, each submission in three categories. They are as follows:

• Drawing Quality - The overall quality of the drawing. One might consider detailing, shading, and accuracy.
• Design Realism - How realistic is the design presented? Any accompanying text may be considered.
• Originality - Does the submission present a new and unique design, or is it a copy of an existing one?

Please attempt to provide an honest evaluation of each participant's submission. Some people put a lot of effort into these challenges, so avoid using a 1 when a higher score is more appropriate. Poll responses which favour a small group of entries with maximum scores in all categories and provide minimum scores to all other entries will be excluded from the final results.

If you have a suggestion for the next challenge, please visit the future challenge ideas thread. Don't be afraid to repeat someone else's suggestion as it helps me gauge the popularity of the each suggestion.



When does this challenge end in my timezone?
UTC-12: August 15, 23:59 (Official Deadline)
UTC-11: August 16, 00:59
UTC-10: August 16, 01:59 (Hawaii Standard Time)
UTC-9: August 16, 02:59
UTC-8: August 16, 03:59 (Pacific Standard Time)
UTC-7: August 16, 04:59 (Mountain Standard Time)
UTC-6: August 16, 05:59 (Central Standard Time)
UTC-5: August 16, 06:59 (Eastern Standard Time)
UTC-4: August 16, 07:59 (Atlantic Standard Time)
UTC-3: August 16, 08:59
UTC-2: August 16, 09:59
UTC-1: August 16, 10:59
UTC: August 16, 11:59 (Greenwhich Mean Time)
UTC+1: August 16, 12:59 (Central European Time)
UTC+2: August 16, 13:59 (Central European Summer Time)
UTC+3: August 16, 14:59
UTC+4: August 16, 15:59
UTC+5: August 16, 16:59
UTC+6: August 16, 17:59
UTC+7: August 16, 18:59
UTC+8: August 16, 19:59 (Australian Western Standard Time)
UTC+9: August 16, 20:59
UTC+10: August 16, 21:59 (Australian Eastern Standard Time)
UTC+11: August 16, 22:59
UTC+12: August 16, 23:59 (New Zealand)
UTC+13: August 17, 00:59
UTC+14: August 17, 01:59 (Line Islands)

[MrSinny]

François-Henri Marquis and his Revolver Modèle de 1862

François-Henri Marquis was among the lucky few of the 19th century's France to have a lot of money and not a lot to do with it. This pushed him to study many domains, including engineering which soon became a passion. From trains, steamers and balloons to machine-tools and mining, his mind wandered everywhere it could until he found himself a vocation for firearms. "J'armerai la France entière" ("I shall weaponize the whole France") he regularly said to his friends who questioned him about his endeavors. In practice though, most of his work ended in darkened paper thrown to the bin and a large drawing table punched manifold. That was until a travel to the United States of America in 1861. There he witnessed a demonstration of the Savage lever action revolver that was soon to equip the U.S. Navy. According to the legend, he jumped on a piece of paper as soon as he arrived at his hotel and never left it until the transatlantic liner dropped him back at Brest, in France. There, in 1862, with the collaboration of Etienne Delorme, a Parisian gunsmith, he set up a small shop to put his ideas into practice. After a few handmade iterations and prototypes, the Modèle de 1862 Marquis revolver in its definitive form was born. Decided to settle a fortune that, he assumed, could only grow with this undoubtedly fantastic and handy revolver, he poured most of his money into setting an assembly line on the outskirts of France's capital. Sadly for him, he misjudged the colossal task it was to find a place in the already quite crowded European gun industry.
The lever action revolver he devised was all but suited to the market. It was a large, expensive, and complex gun firing a wimpy paper cartridge. The mechanism was prone to failure and a nightmare to clean. The arrival of Colt revolvers and affordable (though of dubious quality) copies of them only pushed him closer to the edge. By 1965, he who wanted his weapons to flood France had only sold a little over two hundred pistols, mostly to firearm curiosity enthusiasts. All of his attempts at attracting the various European armies failed miserably and his ultimate gamble, trying to make a room for himself on the American market, only netted him less than a dozen more sales, his weapon equally unsuited to the harsh reality of the time. This lead our man down the path of depression with alcohol and prostitutes waiting at every turn. The 27th of July 1967, entangled in a scandal involving a well-known actress, crippled by debts and without a Franc left in his pockets, François-Henri Marquis resolved to suicide rather than bankruptcy and further shame. Ultimate irony of fate, he was found hanged in his office with one of his revolvers lying on his desk, jammed.
A total of 354 of these weapons were built including prototypes. Extremely rare nowadays due to their fragility and the loss of many of them thrown into the heat of the Franco-Prussian war and Paris Commune as last ditch weapons, they are prized by collectors as exotic revolvers and display of fine French craftsmanship.

[IJNRedshirt]

Question: For the purposes of the challenge, are pepperboxes counted as revolvers? Or do they not meet the criterion? Looking for an official ruling here before moving to the next design phase.

[Karle94]

I highly doubt pepperboxes count. "Big iron" is used for either large, or large caliber revolvers. Pepperboxes can be big, but they don't fire bullets, and as such, don't cont as firearms.

[Kiwi Imperialist]

Question: For the purposes of the challenge, are pepperboxes counted as revolvers? Or do they not meet the criterion? Looking for an official ruling here before moving to the next design phase.

After some consideration, I have decided to exclude pepper-box revolvers. A third rule specifically prohibiting them has been added to the design requirements section in the opening post. I hope this decision does not unduly stifle your creativity.

[Pantsu]

An update to the masterson patent, using .38 Long colt cartridges fired from 6 chambers. Masterson Duelist is an update to the already existing masterson patent revolver, featuring a few additions over the older black powder cap n ball model.

edit: Changing my submission to the contest, the BP one is good but I like this a little better.

[Aiseus]

Reitus' Frontier Type Revolver

With the defeat and annexation of the Aggrenarian Empire in 1821 came wide new swaths of land for the Hymuth Empire to administer. As a region of sparsely populated desert and oasis towns, exerting control deep into the territory and even moving troops between locations was difficult, and Hymuth grip over the region was tenuous at best. This erupted into violence in the Great Aggrenarian Revolt in 1845, mostly caused by Hymuth attempts to centralize their rule of the region without having the necessary control. To combat this, the Hymuth Empire established a gendarmerie (known as the Special Constabulary of the Imperial Aggrenarian Territories) to police these territories in 1853. A primarily mounted force to traverse the wide stretches of desert, these troops needed a lightweight, reliable, and hardy handgun, and this was quickly found out when feedback began to pour in from the troops regarding their dissatisfaction with the long rifles they'd been given. For this task, the Hymuths commissioned famed gunsmith and Hymuth local Makaharus Reitus in 1857 for the task. The result was the Frontier Revolver, a single-action 6-shot cartridge revolver that was Hymuth's first cartridge revolver. Simple, easy to use, and relatively resilient, the revolver was a success on release, but it was only produced in small numbers owing to its limited scope, intended only to be used by the Special Constabulary. In total, only about 25,000 were built, as by the early 1900s the revolver had been replaced by semi-automatic blowback pistols.

Edit: changed a date to fit better with the AU

[Kiwi Imperialist]

A couple of questions have come up on Shipbucket's Discord server. They relate to stocks and turret guns. In response to these questions, the following lines have been added to the Design Requirements section:

4. Turret guns, where the chambers rotate about an axis perpendicular to the barrel, are not allowed.
5. A stock is permitted if the stock is a detachable non-permanent addition to the gun, and if the revolver is usable without the stock.

[Featherduster]

This is an semiautomatic, auto-ejecting pinfire revolver.
Is it a mechanical shitpost? Yes.
Will it work? I do believe so. it will probably jam though. A lot.

[JCSTCap]

1861 Mahtsrevolver, Late Pattern - Grav Janec var Armhausd's Personal Sidearm

Adopted in 1861 and used in various patterns into the 1920s, the Mahtsrevolver was the ubiquitous sidearm of Mero-Curgovina's land forces even after the introduction of the first automatic handguns before the Grand Campaigns. Chambered for six rounds of the powerful .44 Arsenal cartridge, the revolver was known for extreme stopping power that kept it useful long after other handguns would fall out of favour.

Depicted here is the personal handgun of Grand Campaigns Colonel Janec, Grav var Armhausd. The late pattern top frame and hammer suggest that the Grav's weapon was purchased no earlier than 1895. Most apparent about the weapon are the ivory grip panels and the intricate floral gold damascene. Additionally the weapon features a significantly darker bluing, performed in-factory on weapons selected for the damascene procedure. Taking potentially hundreds of hours of labour from skilled craftsmen, damascene firearms were reserved for the nobility and long-serving officers of Mero-Curgovina.

Reportedly never fired in anger, var Armhausd's personal Mahtsrevolver was lost following his assassination in 1924 before resurfacing in 1967 in the hands of a private collector in Modrovia. The late Grav's surviving family purchased the firearm back, now loaning it as a museum piece to the Parliamentary Military Heritage Museum in Peranthrun. It resides there to this day as part of an exhibition on weapons as art pieces.