Police Te Tari Pureke say that more than a third of all firearms licence holders have registered their firearms, with New Zealand’s Firearms Registry recording its 400,000th gun now linked to an individual licence holder. Te Tari Pureke – Firearms Safety Authority, says the 400,000th firearm was one of more than 1000 guns added to the Registry in one day, on 1 May. These firearms are held by 81,400 individual licence holders, or 36 percent of licenced gun owners in New Zealand.
In other words - around two thirds of NZ Licensed Firearms Owners continue to avoid registering their legally owned guns.
WILL POLICE PLEASE EXPLAIN HOW A LIST OF LEGAL FIREARM SERIAL NUMBERS AND THEIR LOCATIONS ACHIEVES ANYTHING - OTHER THAN A SHOPPING LIST FOR CRIMINAL HOME INVADERS, THIEVES & NUTTERS:
- WOULD TE TARI PUREKE COLLATE A LIST OF ALL SWORN POLICE OFFICERS & THEIR HOME ADDRESSES TO ADVANCE CRIME FIGHTING?
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I seem to have bought a well used antique English 'Beaumont Adams' five shot 4" revolver made by London Armoury Co. .. which indicates it's manufacture date to 1856-59 - claimed to be .31" blackpowder caliber, - but I measure the chambers at 0.335"- and the rifled muzzle bore at .340 inch.
Caliber: 120 bore aka .338" or .340" ?- Depending on who you read ..
This suggests Hollow base .34 Conicals required to be historically correct .. and a chamber reamer needed (or some fine abrasive paper wound around a dowel) as - for accuracy, the chambers ought to be slightly larger than the rifled bore.
The trigger return spring was 'at fault' (missing) - but I have made one from a 4 mm wide steel strip off an old hacksaw blade, cut, heated & bent into a fitted Vshape. - Fixed.
- Yeah I know it's yet another one - don't tell my wife (ex). - It's an old mans' indulgence.
- NZ Police Arms & Ballistics Officer G G Kelly writes in Chapter 12 of his book 'THE GUN IN THE CASE' about a Deane & Adams Revolver taken from a museum exhibit seventy-five years after the Maori Wars in Taranaki - The revolver had sat in storage for decades with two chambers loaded .. until a sixteen year old boy experimating with mixed percussion caps in an attic, after nicking the gun, set-off the old powder & the heavily oxidized lead bullet with unintended but deadly impact into his own temple. - Two loaded chambers had remained "live" in the cylinder perhaps for as long as 75 years.
- That's an interesting book if you find one at a school fair ..
Robert Adams 1810-1870 was a very active revolver designer and manufacturer of the mid 1800's. He may have been a difficult man to work with, as he changed partnerships many times - but his Revolvers were the very first "self cocking revolvers" and were highly successful and reliable - to the extent that Sam Colt failed to take-over the British market because they preferred the Adams's.
This revolver is a Beaumont-Adams - but I'm thinking that there are sliding links between English makers Adams, Deane - to Deane, Adams & Deane - to Beaumont-Adams, - London Armoury Company, to Tranter & Kerrs & then to Kerr's Patent Revolvers .. In 1867 Robert's cousin? John Adams left 'London Armoury Co' to set-up 'Adams Patent Small Arms Co.' .. other associated names later are Kynoch Gun Factory (Aston Arms Factory) (& Tranter Brothers Gunmakers) and Kynoch/Schlund - then on again to BSA British Small Arms. (note: Kerr & Adams were cousins.)
You might say that these English gunmakers had flexible incestuous relationships .. working together to the extent that Adams often relied upon frames manufactured by William Tranter to manufacture his own revolvers!
The U S link seems to be Civil War sales, with several hundred Adams guns made under licence by the Massachusetts Arms Company 1857-61 - while Adams revolvers were made on the European mainland in Belgium by, for one, PIRLOT FRERES (brothers).
When in 1867 - Robert Adams brother?/cousin? John Adams set-up in competition - with a freshened, cartridge design, it was adopted by the British Military as the official sidearm for the army until 1880.
There is a variety of progressively developed "Adams" type revolvers out in the antique collectors world .. enough to spend lots of $$$$ on while searching for examples. Then there are the later breech loading Cartridge guns ..
As pointed-out by a mate .. I do seem to be building up a sizable collection of antique sidearms and pocket carry pistols eh.
Note: The early Adams revolvers were made without levers to ram home the bullets, so the bullets had to be pushed into the chambers by hand - these projectiles used "spiked" pills to hold a waxed WAD of leather or wool felt to the base, that was meant to lock the loose fitting projectiles in place in the chambers ..
Marty K.