Registered User
Just looking back at one of the posts & saw a mention of Flobert. I've seen references say that the rimfire bb cap he invented was from around 1840, in .22, so this could have established a market that believed .22 was the way to go for indoor training/fun shooting. Hence when someone wanted to get into that market with an air rifle the .22 would have been the way to go as it was already an accepted calibre for thst purpose. Dont know why Flobert adopted the .22 in tbe first place though.....
Calibre Specific User
Flobert is 1840'ish... the suggestion being his indoor guns (a novelty 'parlour' toy) originally developed out of putting a lead ball into a percussion cap. Eventually refined into 'Rimfire' in .22, which predates any airgun caliber by decades.Originally Posted by trajectory
Airgun Alchemist, Collector and Scribe
Very interesting. I had a quick look on the net and found this, which describes a signed Flobert pistol dated to about 1855, and definitely .22. https://metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/24936Flobert is 1840'ish... the suggestion being his indoor guns (a novelty 'parlour' toy) originally developed out of putting a lead ball into a percussion cap. Eventually refined into 'Rimfire' in .22, which predates any airgun caliber by decades.
(In France the metric system was in place, so Flobert would have considered his calibre to be 5.6 mm rather than .22 inches)
So we can now push the date of .22 calibre back to the 1840-50’s period, and can assume that airguns played no part in developing this calibre. The question now remains, did Flobert come up with the size himself, or was he just using 5.6mm percussion caps that were already in common usage at the time?We now need an expert historian in early nineteenth century firearms to comment.
Incidentally, it is very true as noted earlier that it is often the simplest questions that are the most difficult to answer. A classic example is the waisted airgun pellet. Despite being one of the most important advances in airgun technoloigy, no one has yet been able to determine who invented them, or who was the first to commercialise them.
Registered User
Probably shouldn't rely on my memory but if I stick to generalities I might be ok.
Muzzle loading firearms ; originally powder, wads, patches ball or shot were all seperately carried. Then someone decided to use pre measured powder charges possibly in Europe at any rate in France for the first time but then more widely adopted, which was wraped in paper. Some reports suggest they were in use as far back at 14th or 15th Cent, And yes I think that's where the term"cartridge paper" comes from. Then someone decided to add a ball to this & hey presto the next step was taken, then the next stage was someone adding a priming cap to the base of the powder charge to make the needle fire. Dreyse was the first to get all the individual components to come together around 1835/1836 But parented a few years later(?) but he'd been working on it for years before. Then it was a matter of time & increments before the full metallic cartridges both rimfire & centrefire. The thing about the Dreyse system wasnt just the assembly of the components, it probably introduced the breach loader into becomming a popular, practicality.
Calibre Specific User
http://www.airgunbbs.com/showthread....is-the-historyVery interesting. I had a quick look on the net and found this, which describes a signed Flobert pistol dated to about 1855, and definitely .22. https://metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/24936
(In France the metric system was in place, so Flobert would have considered his calibre to be 5.6 mm rather than .22 inches)
So we can now push the date of .22 calibre back to the 1840-50’s period, and can assume that airguns played no part in developing this calibre. The question now remains, did Flobert come up with the size himself, or was he just using 5.6mm percussion caps that were already in common usage at the time?
Incidentally, it is very true as noted earlier that it is often the simplest questions that are the most difficult to answer. A classic example is the waisted airgun pellet. Despite being one of the most important advances in airgun technoloigy, no one has yet been able to determine who invented them, or who was the first to commercialise them.
The other thread covers derivation of .22 as a caliber - first introduced in 1845:
"...A gallery gun, Flobert gun, saloon gun, or parlor gun is a type of firearm designed for indoor shooting. These guns were first developed in 1845 when French inventor Louis Nicolas Flobert modified a percussion cap to hold a small lead bullet." [source: wikipedia]
In the same year: "Flobert modified the cap further by creating a rim at the edge so that the cap and bullet could fit in a chamber of a pistol
So we already know use of .22 in rimfire appears well before airgun.
HOWEVER: I am intrigued to know when the first waisted pellets are invented - I believe someone has already offered this to be after 1900?
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