I can personally attest to Mac’s incredible craftsmanship as a few year ago I was lucky enough to take possession of one of the three BSA pistols that he made (this one marked with serial number 3). http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q...BSANormana.jpg
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q...BSANormanb.jpg
I have taken it apart a few times , once to take the liberty of reblueing it (as it came with some scratches) and the complexity and precision of the build is amazing. No wonder back in 1912 the gun never made it commercially – it would have cost a bomb to make and the low power would never have justified the cost. Despite its complexity, Mac’s pistol cocks and fires reliably.
I have no idea what happened to Mac’s other two pistols, but I do know that at one tine this other example http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q...BSANormanM.jpg
with case was owned by a Swedish collector.
Mac’s work on making prototypes from scratch was a great inspiration to me, and made me decide to try to learn a few gunmaking skills of my own from scratch. So I got myself a lathe and a few books and embarked on making a reproduction early nineteenth century bellows air pistol for my collection, as only two are known to exist and this was the only way I would ever get one. Luckily the great American collector Larry Hannusch kindly sent me scale photographs of his pistol and its innards, which enabled me to start the build. It is now virtually complete just requiring some brass inlay cosmetic work. The hardest parts were boring the barrel and making the bellows, and the most fun part was casting the brass trigger guard.
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q...lowspistol.jpg
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q.../Powerunit.jpg
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q...relrelease.jpg