Girandoni hybrid

[Benelli B76]

One of Lawrie's latest acquisitions, a Girardoni-Heiberger hybrid, probably a one off or the last remaining example. This particular rifle is mentioned in Arne Hoff's book near the top of page 72 and on the Beeman Collection webpage on Girandoni, lower down on the page. Calibre 11 mm (.433) probably bored for the Austrian military ball round. Lawrie runs it on CO2.

Baz

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[Garvin]

Extraordinary find! Thanks for sharing, Baz.

[Jerry Cornelius]

Golly! What an amazing find

[Benelli B76]

I believe that an article on this Girardoni hybrid may appear in a UK airgun magazine.

Baz

[micky2]

What a great find. l always wanted one of those but could never afford one.

[DT Fletcher]

One of Lawrie's latest acquisitions, a Girardoni-Heiberger hybrid, probably a one off or the last remaining example. This particular rifle is mentioned in Arne Hoff's book near the top of page 72 and on the Beeman Collection webpage on Girandoni, lower down on the page. Calibre 11 mm (.433) probably bored for the Austrian military ball round. Lawrie runs it on CO2.

Baz

No sure why this is being called a hybrid. It's simply a Heilberger, Wien, gun with a girandoni-style barrel. Other than that, Girandoni had nothing to do with this gun and was long dead (1799) before it was made. The Girandoni-style magazine was widely used in Austria, Switzerland, England and elsewhere by the time this gun was made, circa 1820-1840. Note that section in Hoff's that references this maker is: "Copies of the Girandoni System"

It would be nice to have better pictures of this gun. I suspect that I have pictures of another gun that looks to have the same lock plate as this one. The hammer design is very distinctive. Also, would be great to get a picture of the left-side plate which appears to have a lever de-cock safety, which is somewhat unusual for an Austrian design which usually have the de-cock button on top. My guess is, because of that left side decock and design of the hammer, that this would be a later, maybe circa 1820-1830 design.

[Benelli B76]

Called a hybrid because it looks like there seems to be only one of these in existence and it is evident according to Lawrie that someone has assembled two types of rifle together. Not claiming that Girardoni or Heiberger had anything to do with this particular rifle. Its a fine performer, very interesting, and brings joy to its new owner, which is what our hobby is all about. We are attempting to get high res pics available for the Vintage Airgun site.

Baz

[greenwayjames]

No sure why this is being called a hybrid. It's simply a Heilberger, Wien, gun with a girandoni-style barrel. Other than that, Girandoni had nothing to do with this gun and was long dead (1799) before it was made. The Girandoni-style magazine was widely used in Austria, Switzerland, England and elsewhere by the time this gun was made, circa 1820-1840. Note that section in Hoff's that references this maker is: "Copies of the Girandoni System"

It would be nice to have better pictures of this gun. I suspect that I have pictures of another gun that looks to have the same lock plate as this one. The hammer design is very distinctive. Also, would be great to get a picture of the left-side plate which appears to have a lever de-cock safety, which is somewhat unusual for an Austrian design which usually have the de-cock button on top. My guess is, because of that left side decock and design of the hammer, that this would be a later, maybe circa 1820-1830 design.

Are you sure that you have the right Heiberger ?

[DT Fletcher]

Called a hybrid because it looks like there seems to be only one of these in existence and it is evident according to Lawrie that someone has assembled two types of rifle together. Not claiming that Girardoni or Heiberger had anything to do with this particular rifle. Its a fine performer, very interesting, and brings joy to its new owner, which is what our hobby is all about. We are attempting to get high res pics available for the Vintage Airgun site.

Baz

The more pics the better!

My intent was only to tamp down any idea that this gun was made by Girandoni, unfortunately doing so is something of a regular habit.

Unless this is the same gun as seen on Beeman's web page, there are at least 2 of this exact type of Heiberger around. There is also a pic of a single shot version available on via a google search. So, this very nice air gun, while certainly not common, is not unique.

It would be good to know what it is that makes it look like it was combined from 2 different guns. The barrel assembly on these guns is intended to be removed and, like already stated, there are single shot versions of this gun.

C. Heiberger is a well known name. According to Wolff, he's listed in Stockel as being active circa 1750. From what I've seen, folks have been using that date for the Heiberger guns. Wolff lists Heiberger as making an early variety of Austrian Butt Reservoir airguns. However, I'm not convinced. The Heiberger do look primitive, with that wild hammer design, but the features (Girandoni mag, side cocking safety) all point to a later gun. It's entirely possible that the Heiberger firm was a family affair which operated into the 1800s.

Having any Austrian circa 1800 airgun is a great collectable. Having one in shooting condition is outstanding. Would love to see a video of it being shot.

The Meriwether Lewis Bruno Island airgun accident:
It would also be great to have a demonstration of how the gun discharges when the hammer is pushed closed Warning, these airguns will discharge (dumping the entire load from the tank) when the hammer is de-cocked. While this might take a lot of pressure when the gun is fully charged, when the pressure level is lower, just the hammer spring can have enough strength to push through and actually open the exhaust valve. So, this is safety demonstration and, if done, needs to be done with great caution. These guns are extremely dangerous! The operation of these guns are completely different from modern airguns. Not understanding how these guns work can and has! been the cause of accidents. There are at least 2 reports of accidental discharges of this type of rifle in modern times.

So far, nobody has taken up the M. Lewis Bruno Is. accident challenge. Been waiting years for somebody to finely do this experiment. Unfortunately, we'll probably have to wait until somebody actually injures themselves with one of these guns before the word gets through and somebody makes a video demonstration for all to see with their own eyes.

Here's a link for the pic of the single shot Heiberger at Vintage Airguns UK http://www.vintageairguns.co.uk/air-...=38&photo=1781

[greenwayjames]

More pictures would be nice but the description of it as a hybrid is about right especially when viewed from above. The two parts dont "flow" together at all well. My guess is that it is an early Heiberger, of around 1750 or so when he was listed as an airgun maker in Wien, butt reservoir and action married to a later Girardoni style repeater front end. The so called wild hammer style is earlier than the typical Girardoni if you look at pictures of contemporary butt and ball reservoir guns.
I bow to your superior knowledge on most things but you are to blame for sparking off my interest in researching these old masterpieces

[DT Fletcher]

More pictures would be nice but the description of it as a hybrid is about right especially when viewed from above. The two parts dont "flow" together at all well. My guess is that it is an early Heiberger, of around 1750 or so when he was listed as an airgun maker in Wien, butt reservoir and action married to a later Girardoni style repeater front end. The so called wild hammer style is earlier than the typical Girardoni if you look at pictures of contemporary butt and ball reservoir guns.
I bow to your superior knowledge on most things but you are to blame for sparking off my interest in researching these old masterpieces

I agree that the barrel and receiver don't flow together but that goes with this design that invites a variety of barrels to be attached. Look at the single shot version of this gun and it too looks weird. http://www.vintageairguns.co.uk/wp-c...1781.jpg?ver=1

The chances of this Heiberger being circa 1750 is near zero.

When studying the evolution of airgun locks, the one thing that becomes pretty clear is that initially airgun locks are little different from flint locks. Then, as airgun designs developed on their own, the hammers look less and less like they would work on a flintlock. The hammer on this Austrian gun looks very much like the hammers seen on some of the 1800-1820 London Staudenmayer airguns which also look nothing like a flint lock. So, based on that observation, I think this hammer, along with the gun, are circa 1820-1830. Of course, that's just an (somewhat) educated guess. The history of Austrian airguns has yet to be written.

One thing that might be possible to investigate is the operations of Heiberger in Vienna. By the early 1800s, it required a special license to manufacture airguns, so, presumably there should be some records on that. I know of other Vienna airgun manufacturers being investigated this way.

[DT Fletcher]

I bow to your superior knowledge on most things but you are to blame for sparking off my interest in researching these old masterpieces

I fully welcome others to investigate these, as you say, masterpieces. If interested, I can supply my bibliography of reference works (Hoff, Wolff are the main ones; Airgun Batteries is particularly important, imo) If you haven't already, you might want to take a look at the work I did on British Pneumatic Airguns which is readily available: This breaks down a large number of British airguns by the battery type (Wolff). Note that this same type of work really wouldn't show much with Austrian airguns since there is, as far as I can recall, only the one type: Austrian Butt Reservoir. To study the evolution of air gun batteries, the only viable option are the British airguns.

Note: when investigating Austrian airguns, one of the most important things is to take a look at the safety de-cocking lever/button. It is extremely rare -almost unheard of- for an Austrian airgun to not have a de-cock safety. Plus, the vast majority of these Austrian de-cock safety are nothing more than a button on top of the receiver. That this Heiberger has a left-side de-cock safety lever (very much in the English style) makes me think that this is on the later side of 1820-1840 rather than 1750. Note: again, we do not have a proper history of Austrian airguns. There may well be very early types with no safety but, if they exist, they haven't appeared at any of the auctions or in any book (that I can recall)

The English de-cock safety has a different story. At first, the early (English manufacture of Austrian Butt Reservoir began about 1795) airguns had no safety de-cock lever. Then, with later guns, the left-side safety de-cock lever seems to have become the norm. The Austrian-style push button safety almost never exists on an English made airgun.

[Benelli B76]

The rifle we are discussing is the actual hybrid shown on the Beeman collection webpage. It belonged to the well known collector David Swan who supplied all the pictures to Beeman. That is why we are very surprised that you say there is another example of this rifle. All the information on the Beeman webpage is what the new owner Lawrie Amatruda is quoting, as he acquired it from a guy who bought it from the David Swan collection. Lawrie is one of the top guys in U.K. for repairing CO2 and pneumatic weapons and has repaired many items sent all the way from the U.S.A. I think he is ranked one of the top repairers of the Schimel with its four valve setups, and also has done hundreds of 600's and other Crosmans. I think he is probably the right guy to be able to appreciate and own this vintage weapon.

Baz

[DT Fletcher]

So, then I agree that we've only seen on of these Heiberger airguns with a Girandoni style mag barrel attached. I have already pointed that there are other Heiberger's with straight barrels. I'm sure if some effort was put forth, we would find more of them.

Good to know that the info was from Beeman. Sounds exactly like something he would come up with and goes to explain why I jumped on it. Normally, I avoid any contact with Beeman's fiction writing.

Certainly sounds like this airgun is in the right hands. Just hope that he fully understands the important safety issues involved in operating these airguns.

[Garvin]

Certainly sounds like this airgun is in the right hands. Just hope that he fully understands the important safety issues involved in operating these airguns.

He's using it with CO2 and since Lawrie is 'Mr CO2', I'm sure it's very safe.