The J. B. Peters Air Pistol

[Garvin]

I find it strange that this inventor went to all the trouble of designing, patenting and building what is quite an attractive air pistol and yet was content to have the cocking lever/piston travel such a short distance and so, along with the small diameter power plant, generate so little power. Surely it wouldn't have been that difficult to have the lever bypass a narrower trigger guard and a larger compression chamber travel a bit further. Maybe another prototype with these kind of tweaks exists somewhere.

[Leonardj]

I find it strange that this inventor went to all the trouble of designing, patenting and building what is quite an attractive air pistol and yet was content to have the cocking lever/piston travel such a short distance and so, along with the small diameter power plant, generate so little power. Surely it wouldn't have been that difficult to have the lever bypass a narrower trigger guard and a larger compression chamber travel a bit further. Maybe another prototype with these kind of tweaks exists somewhere.

Might make for an interesting project during the cold winter months here in Canada.
Perhaps scaled up enough to utilize light weight .177 pellets.

[draitzer]

Quite an amazing find, Len. Your gun resembles the patent drawings so closely, with a pretty clever design principle even if underpowered. The patent shows a mighty large dead space ahead of the piston leading to the transfer port, which can't help the output. Is the real pistol built that way?

Don R.

[Leonardj]

Quite an amazing find, Len. Your gun resembles the patent drawings so closely, with a pretty clever design principle even if underpowered. The patent shows a mighty large dead space ahead of the piston leading to the transfer port, which can't help the output. Is the real pistol built that way?

Don R.

Hi Don,
There are a few very subtle differences between the patent drawings and the actual gun, but yes, that large dead space is there.

[Troubledshooter]

Hi Len, hope you are keeping well.
Even though it's not really my scene, another amazing little known air pistol comes to light, nice one Len.

[Leonardj]

This helpful information was posted to my thread on the American Vintage Airgun Forum by DWTrull in response to my comment that this pistol was found in Nova Scotia, Canada:

"That makes sense since James Bernard Peters was originally a Canadian born in Nova Scotia Canada.
It probably ended up with the family back in Canada when he passed.
Undoubtedly the gun was never mass produced. I suspect your gun may be the "Prototype" of the pistol.
Peters may have hand produced a handful of pistols since he was an accomplished machinist,
but its also just as likely that he only produced the one prototype which went back to Nova Scotia when he died.
I think your pistol is likely the prototype due to where it was found and likely the only example in the world.
It was a one in a million chance that you found that pistol! And I know you love all things Canadian!!
The Peters was made by a Canadian living in the US, and returned to Canada."