Italy Modernizes: the Carcano Needlefire Rifle Conversion
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- Опубликовано: 8 сен 2024
- When Prussia and its Dreyse needle fire rifles defeated Austria and its muzzleloaders at Shadow in 1866, much of the world took note. In Italy, the reactive was to immediately begin looking for both a new rifle and also a system for converting existing stockpiles of muzzleloaders into something more modern. After considering separate-primer systems like the Albini, Manceaux, and Lindner; metallic cartridges, and needle fire cartridges, the Italians decided upon Salvatore Carcano’s needle fire system as the idea solution.
Reusing the existing muzzleloader barrels meant a caliber of 17.5mm, and needle fire paper cartridges were substantially lighter than metallic cartridges of that size. The needle fire system could still fire an impressive 8 shots per minute, and at less than 10 Lira per gun, the conversion was affordable.
Carcano’s system was based on the Doersch-Baumgarten needle fire system, which was in itself an improvement on the Dreyse. The rear end of an existing muzzleloader barrel was cut away and a bolt added to the gun. While it is an unorthodox type of firing system, Carcano’s design incorporates multiple safety mechanisms and is remarkably good for its cost. The first conversions were made in 1867, with 18,000 guns for the Bersaglieri. This was followed by conversions for the Carabinieri in 1869 and for the Artillery in 1871. This example, like most of the surviving ones, is an 1844/67 Artillery type. These guns were never used in a major conflict, and most were eventually scrapped, leaving them pretty rare today.
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"The operating system is a little bit quirky and unusual."
Exactly what i came here for
"Unusual and quirky"
*30 MINUTES OF HOW AND WHY*
That's actually kind of a clever solution for that time period; a semi-modern coversion that can then be scrapped for a proper brass cartridge gun without spending a fortune on developing an intermittent model from the ground up.
So the bolt basically works like a Bic ballpen? That's hilarious.
Starts clicking my Bic*
Everybody else in the trench:
Nono, your Bic ballpen works like a Carcano
Pretty clever conversion of a musket
OMG it does
They were used in what qualified as a "minor skirmish", the taking of Rome in 1870 ( Bersaglieri at Porta Pia, 20 September.)
With the securing of Rome, the Papal Forces with their M67 Remington ( 12.7x44R otherwise a .50/70 type) by Nagant of Liege, were disbanded, and the Papal Remingtons were issued to the Bersaglieri who had taken Rome.
These were replaced in Turn by the first Vetterli rifles, as they were Produced ( 1871-3).
The French troops garrisoned in Rome were armed with M66 Chassepot rifles.
Direct conflict, Carcano vs Chassepot.
Doc AV
Btw you won't believe how many different police corps Italy maintains with different names and different tasks: the carabinieri you mentioned in the video, who are the military police basically but operate all over the nation, the polizia or metropolitan police, the guardia di finanza who attends to economical fellonies, the polizia municipale or traffic police
@Count of Flanders not really. The main difference is that Carabinieri is part of the military, Polizia is not.
Well we disbanded the Forest Guards two years ago or so. Things might get simpler in the future.
Not really a surprise we have similar idea in the United States we have city police ,county police , state police we have state bureaus of investigations, federal bureau of investigation, border guards and multiple police agency's to deal with drugs ,firearms and alcohol we are one of the most policed places in the world yet we have fewer police officers than we actually need ! Irony
@@hikariyouk pretty much yes, but they depend on the ministry of defence as a military corp, while the polizia depend on the ministry of internal affairs
Thank you Ian. Best coverage of a Carcano I have ever seen. Clever idea to make the rubber obturator renewed with each cartridge loaded. These make Dreyse rifles seem commonplace in the modern market.
I’m not too familiar with carcano rifles, so at first I thought it was a ww1 era carcano converted to needlefire, and I was really really confused
"We learned some lessons after 11ish battles of the Isonzo, but to be honest I'm not sure they are the right lessons; so presenting your new needlefire rifle"
“After lessons learned in the Great War we’ve decided that all 1911s be converted to flintlock” -Pershing, probably
"pretty unknown" one might say …. Forgotten
"But I don't speak needle fire..." "Like I said third best."
Gorlamee................................Dominca De Coaco .
Margharehteh!
No gun is too old to not learn something from. Thanks.
the french army had the famous Chassepot in November 1867 during the Mentana Battle between Giuseppe Garibaldi (with the army of Savoia's king and future king of Italy Vittorio Emanuele III) and that was the main reason why the french army won over the Savoia's. Maybe the only case we studied about a rifle in the whole entire school education path in Italy
Nice looking little carbine and rapidly moving towards looking like a fairly modern rifle.
I did a quick search, and here is what I found. The kingdom of Piedmont bought .69 caliber Smooth bore Muskets starting in 1844. In 1860 they were updated by rifling their barrels.This weapon could be an 1844/60/67 pretty cool.
that's a huge bore for sure
That decocking safety is brilliant.
All through out the video, the biggest thing I thought is
'That sight is pretty cute.'
Ian : Oh those are all broken down.
Is it just me, or are the safety mechanisms both significant and advanced for such an early time period?
Thanks gun jesus love your channels and videos keep up the great work!
Great video!
I like the mecanics of this rifle very much!
Genius design.
Hey Ian, i was wondering why you would remove the cleaning rods from the rifles when converting them? Of course you dont need them as a ramrod anymore, but Its still a blackpowder gun that needs to be cleaned often and you might need to punch a stuck case or a bore obstruction out.... would save you the cost of making a seperate piece of equipment to clean the bore with, in my mind.
many countries were switching to pull through cleaning systems as they adopted breechloaders because of the compactness and how much cheaper a bit of string is than a rod
@@micahreid5553 But you already have the rod *right there*... and if the bore diameter didn't change, it's even the right one. Asides from that, time and storage are money...
@@mfree80286 The metal in the cleaning rod is a resource, similar to money in the bank... this was before our current post scarcity era... logistics is a nightmare
Thank you Ian. There was so little information on the Carcano needle gun regarding in-depth practical details and photos on the internet. The local library and college/university do not have books on vintage firearms even old books.
Carcano wanted to do a metallic cartridge conversion but the cost was too high, so he came with this very cheap needle conversion . When General La Marmora who was both the head of the accepting commission and commander of the Bersaglieri Corps complained that precision of the converted guns was not enough for his Bersaglieri Carcano is said to have replied "For 5 Lire do you even want it to shoot straight?" :-)
Further comment, whilst the Prussians trounced the Austro-Bavarians in 1866, the Italians were roundly defeated both on Land (Custoza) and at Sea ( Lissa) by the Austrians.
Thus the search for a suitable Breech Loader for modernization...the Swiss Vetterli system would be adopted in 1870, but as a stopgap, the Carcano conversion Needle fire came into use by 1868. The Artillery musketoon shown was the 1834 Bersaglieri shortrifle, with
" Swiss" pattern rear sights ( for more accurate " Sharpshooter" use, and the
Brunswick bayonet bar, for a sabre sword bayonet with the same reach as a normal Rifle.
As mentioned in other comments, the M67 Carcano was used by the Bersaglieri in the Taking of Rome ( 1870), but was quickly replaced by captured 12,7 Papal Remingtons, until sufficient Vetterli single shot centre fire rifles were available.
DocAV
Simplicity at it's best with that conversion. Bet some bureaucrat was wondering how to convert their converted rifles over to metallic cartridges when that time came .
I was drooling through the video because of the brass finishing
As conversions go this seems like one of the better ones in practice.
The Spanish also adopted the needle fire system called the Soriano, before they adopted the Spanish Berdan conversion and Spanish Remington Rollingblock.
All of these old gun systems are really neat, but the weird old archaic ones are the best!
loving the everyday videos! keep them coming!!
Carcanó was the master of best we can do with the money and resources we have
I honestly think this is the second-best, because I think it's better than the Dreyse needle-rifle, albeit the Dreyse was made over two-decades before this conversion.
Thank you , Ian .
With poorer quality metal for the barrel, I'd assume any rifling would wear very rapidly? Though at 17.5'm anything it hit would be unhappy.
Probably not. Steel wasn't all that bad back then, especially in terms of wear resistance and hardness. Most of the later improvements in steel had more of an effect on tensile strength, brittleness and corrosion resistance. Plus it's firing a big honking soft lead bullet at pretty low velocities and pressures instead of copper jacketed rounds at well over 2000fps. I suspect corrosion and poor maintenance would kill it long before it was shot out.
@@wingracer1614 At 11:55 Ian mentions that they were still using iron barrels in these firearms. Besides, the steel quality back then legitimately was quite poor in both material and unrefined processes. Ian mentions a major arsenal in another video (Springfield, if memory serves) not using thermometers and instead judging the heat of the barrels by eye which would vary by hundreds of degrees, and this was in the early 1900s, decades after the firearms discussed in this video were made.
@@sqeeye3102 As an engineer and knife maker I must say that judging the temperature of steel by eye before hardening is no problem, as long as the steel is austenitic before quenching it really doesn't make a real difference in hardness, the grain size might be a bit larger when the temperature is too high for too long, and that might mean a very small decrease in tensile strenght, but realistically it will make no difference. If the temperature is lower then austenitic temperature there will no real hardening, but this is very unlikely to happen with an experienced worker. It's also very obvious if any finishing needs to be done after hardening.
Also, as long as the lighting conditions in the factory don't vary too much, and are fairly dim, the temperature won't vary by 100's of degrees, (speaking celcius here) but more likely by 10's of degrees. A difference of 100°C is a very clear change in colour.
@@slome815 Knife making is a very different situation than a pressure vessel containing pressures that are nearly the yield strength of improperly made steel, let alone proof testing pressure. Not to even mention that grain size is extremely important for pressure vessels. No professional barrel maker that I have ever heard of uses a heating process judged by eye in a very long time.
With regard to knife making, even professional companies mess up the heat treat. Not too long ago Benchmade screwed up the heat treat on their Bailout in 3V steel. Cold steel has done it, Kershaw,, Spyderco, just to name a few more. It's a complicated process even when you remove the human element from that specific task. And the downside there is a knife that dulls a little too quickly, not a catastrophic failure of a pressure vessel. I'll pass on any barrels heat treated simply by eye.
@@sqeeye3102 No, it doesn't matter if the steel is meant for guns or springs, or knives. If it's a fairly simple low alloyed steel, and steel in this time would be simple high or medium carbon steel, maybe with some nickel in the alloy. As long as you get hot enough for the steel to be austenitic, and you cool fast enough to avoid having pearlite, you will get a proper hardened steel.
It won't matter all that much if the steel is at 800°C or 900°C when you quench, grain size depends a lot on how long the steel is kept at a certain temperature. But at the low soak times, and fairly low temperatures needed for hardening, there will be a very minor change in strenght, you're talking about changes like going from 700N/mm² to 680N/mm² and no real change in hardness. Unless you gun is a really unsafe design in the first place it will not make a difference.
If heat treatment is bad enough for it to be obvious, it's because there has been a major error, like leaving a batch of parts in the kiln during lunch time, or having small parts and having them cool to below austenitic during transport between the kiln and quenching bath, or only tempering once, or even forgetting tempering altogether.
On a side note, I have seen plenty of bad heat treatments from people who send their parts out to a heat treating service with temperature controlled kilns, but not a single bad heat treatment from a knife maker that does the heat treatment himself by eye. Judging temperature by eye is simply not that hard with a little experience.
It would be really cool to convert a reproduction muzzleloader into something like this.
As with all needle fire guns, that needle looks so fragile. What was the life expectancy of a needle?
Indeed. I thought the whole fire control system made very little sense until he showed how easy it was to remove the needle and thought "Ah, that's whay they did it that way." Easy needle replacement in the field is required with needle fires
Anvil needs to conserve that piece of history.
Hello Ian,
Excellent review again.
Just to mention we have reviewed a Fucile di Fantaria Modello 1860/68 ‘Carcano’ on RUclips channel chambering a facsimile square base Nessler bullet, the Palottola adottata nel 1867.
We have found the Carcano ballistically similar to the Mle. 1867 Tabatière.
The Carcano is of historical significance for needle-ignition system collectors as it featured in the breaching of Porta Pia on the 20th September 1870, when Italy finally took the City of Rome led by a charge of Bersaglieri.
G and L A-R-West
Imagine how things would have been if either side in our Civil War had done something like this to their Enfields and Springfields
I think it is very interesting to see what a country does when it is first unified/created/dragged into the modern world(in Japan's case) because they are forced to play catch-up and make very rapid gains that are still sensible since they're the new kid on the block - they have to play 'smarter' and make better decisions while a more established state can get too comfortable in the present and not think of the immediate future. It goes from being proactive to reactive.
Very well done...As always...Thanks..!
It would be cool to continue your types of actions videos with types of pre-metallic rifle systems.
6:38 pulling the bolt out. That seemed like it was a bit of a pucker moment.
I think that's the coolest Bolt fir needle fire system
This videos very efective for gun makers. Thanks
BTW, cocking manually overrides the bolt opening safety so you can open the bolt without using the pin in front of the trigger, so you would first cock then rotate and oopen the bolt
Just a few weeks ago I bought the second V70 carbine I ever ran across. A lot like this one, but it's the 10.4 cartridge in single shot. Japanese looking dust cover, but rolling under the action, and an SKS style reversing bayonet, stowed inside the stock- where the cleaning rod would have been. Sights and stock look to be interchangeble with VV71's, but I bet they don't... biggest difference? In the 1990's an 'associate' told me to not buy that one I had ever seen, he would find me a better one for less than the 300 the seller wanted... he never did find me one. This 2nd one I ever saw... was a grand and change... makes $300 sound free eh?
Quite the substantial bolt handle.
When you say the old muzzle loaders were "sliced up" I'm interested to know how they went about that. Forgive my ignorance but all I can think of is modern machining ways such as angle grinders etc so how would it have been done back then? Files and the like? Seems like it would have been time consuming!
Oh my god he dry fired it
One of the cooler guns.
What happened to the rubber base on the cartridge after firing? I imagine it would it would be left on the bolt face.
It rested on the base of the barrel when the bolt was opened, so directly ahead of the new bullet, and was expelled with the next shot.
you could review the FIAT REVELLI 1914.
So the each cartridge has a rubber plug? I was wondering why not make it like the cartridge from the Smith Carbine?
Carabinieri in Italy is a police force much like the French Gendarmerie, it's a military corps, they are the italian military police, but are also responsible for heavy crime (like the maffia) and allround police-tasks, including traffic. The Carabinieri operate nationwide, above the Polizia di Stato (or state police), you also have the Polizia Municipale, which you can compare with a local sheriff department, when visiting Italy, one would better be very polite to all three of them, if you encounter them as they all lack sense of humor. (this last I know out of experience) ....
What happened to the rubber base of the cartridge? Did the shooter have to pick it out by hand? Did it burn up? I didn't see an extractor.
It remained at the base of the barrel, and was pushed forward when the new cartridge was inserted, so sitting ahead of the new bullet, to be ejected when it was fired.
Ah, that's pretty cool. Thank you!
So it would appear the the Italians missed the 1850s move from ,75 and ,69 caliber smooth bores, down to the smaller, .54, .577 and .58 caliber rifles. Some of the American, 1842 Cap lock muskets, were rifled as an after thought, though not many. It would be interesting to know more about the Italian 1844 Musket/rifle. A ,69 caliber "mini ball" can weigh in at over 700 grains. That's a lot of lead, and a big hole..
5:18 "largely because...largely ,huh hah" lol
If they were worried about bore diameter leading to more complications with metallic cartridges why not just sleeve the barrels down to whatever standard they wanted for their eventual new rifle?
Because money of course.
M M I think the cost of sleeving the barrels (especially if you’re going to be hacking away at the breach anyway) would be worth not having to both manufacture proprietary ammo and deal with it in the supply chain. Kinda like how the US did early trapdoor conversions and sleeved the barrels down to the standard
@@andyrihn1 the next cartridge will be metallic, we have no way to avoid a double logistic chain, so it was better to spare money in the interim project.
sleeving involves 3 expensive operations: Drilling old bore to a precise new diameter - inserting sleeve which must "become one" with the old barrel (hint: not easy) - Rifling the sleeve. While this conversion left barrel as usual. And no "new standard" whatsoever: they used the same old Minie bullet, powder charge and paper cartridge they had been using, which was _somewhat_ modified: instead of tearing end with your teeth and frontloading and then fitting cap on nipple it includes the cap at the back of the paper cartridge glued to a paper disk. No big deal.
Thanks Ian! This is perfect!
But what about the russian Carle needlefire?
How tf do you aim the rifle with the decocker in the way?
Methinks there’s a typo in the description. I believed he meant to say Sadowa instead of ”Shadow”
Love how Ian said "collection of Italian rifles", like people collect 1 nation's firearms or specific makes/models of firearms, just for fun...
yes i do
In this thread: people not getting it.
@@K3end0 no, it was totally being sarcastic. I know all about specific collections. Since Ian collects French firearms, i found it sacastic of Ian throwing out that statement of Italian rifles. Ease up, sticks & stones hurt, not words
Doug Gallagher yes Mauser military. . especially those created prior to Hitler. Paul Mauser was da man
@@JohnsonLobster yeah ya think? But if 1 person gets it, then its all good
It seems pretty clunky and hard to use. It may be the third best needle fire gun, but it’s the best in terms of implementation and not wasting a ton of money on new quickly obsolete rifles.
Ian can you do a video on the Mouser 1871 , 11mm. Single shot.
Regards Raymond
"When Prussia and its Dreyse needle fire rifles defeated Austria and its muzzleloaders at Shadow in 1866..." Please change "Shadow" to Sadowa. Thank you.
i would really like ian to do a video on the Beretta Cx4 storm or Mx4 storm i think it would make for a interesting video!
Very interesting video as usual! The correct Italian pronunciation is "Càrcano", though.
You didn't explain how to pronounce it
You literally just retyped the name
@@jacksonfitzsimmons4253 No, he clearly indicated the stressed syllable, quite different to the usual english pronunciation.
There is no widely used standard meaning of the grave accent in English. Andruzzi's comment does not clearly indicate anything to an English monoglot, or presumably anyone who doesn't already read Italian.
Why did Ian push the sear in by hand and not with the universal disassembly tool?
@forgottenweapons
This rifle had a pretty important role in the battle of Porta Pia where basically Italy took over the Vatican!
Speaking of "Needle gun", while searching this video, I seem something interesting that Russian have a Needle gun with Carl System, but the video is too short
You should do a video of US Civil War rifles
Gotta admit, that safety system is pretty spiffy.
I like this system, it's simple, effective and idiot proof
Little known fact. Gun Jesus was crucified for our sins, (too many Punisher logos on our Glocks) using needle fire firing pins. Fortunately he was resurrected when they were made obsolete.
That barrell looked pretty rusty back around the bolt. I wonder if it was that bad all the way? Doesn't look like something you would really want to fire.
I couldn't make out how the user replaces the needle in the field. That was mentioned as something important for both the Dreyse and Chasepot.
I was wondering about that also,but after seeing the massive locking lugs and hearing that the barrel is iron I do not think anyone
could be found who was willing to fire it enough to wear down a needle.
@@jeanbaptistevallee4500 With a low pressure black powder gun like this the barrel is probably fine.
So I know they made the needle fire the needle accessible pretty easily because they tend to break but did they issue an additional Striker and needle in case it broke or would you just have if it broke you just have to bring it to the armory to have them replace it or were they give you an extra one in case it broke while you're in battle and then you can continue with the battle
Usually the soldiers were issued with spare needles.
0:42 I think you meant to say
“The Prussians had needle fire and the Italian and Austrian had muzzle loading”
Nice
I collect and handload milsurps. Have 2 one long and one carbine Carcano's with pretty good bores. The sights suck and with the carbine it shoots terrible. Long rifle is better but still don't really shoot them much. Something wrong with their sights ?
Major Battle of 1866 Austro-Prussian war was Battle of Koniggrätz. Today Hradec Králové.
EDIT: I see it now. Sadova it old name for Chlum.
"Avanti bersaglieri che la vittoria é nostra!!!!" Giuseppe Garibaldi.1870.
"Meh..."Napoleon III.1870.
What Bersaglieri means?
@@VonRammsteyn It comes from bersaglio = target and is the name of an Italian specialist light infantry corps, something like the German Jäger. They never march, but run.
@@gfhjkfghj4208 Thank you!
Could you review a Gewehr m.95?
Hello :) I love all these old guns, most with inventions like this. But if i see this gun, this conversion looks more ( this system ) like something from Switzerland than from Italy :) Just my feeling :) Thx for another nice video :)
Putting the rubber seal on the cartridge instead of the gun had to make for very expensive ammunition, right?
Especially back when rubber was expensive to produce and get ahold of
You needed to replace the rubber seal on the head of the bolt every few shots anyway in the Chassepots
Personally I think that this rifle is a very clevel design.
Seems like a three finger salute is needed to pull the action out of the gun.
It's interesting that the United States in the 1860s were still using muskets for the rest of Europe was catching up with bolt actions
@Samuel Bilskie I'm actually surprised that the Americans didn't adopt Winchester like the Russians did during the first World War...... those Russian Winchester's are pretty cool concept
In all fairness, the US was also using lever action rifles, muzzle loaded rifles, and Gatling guns if my memory serves. Not to mention, the US was not considered the most technologically advanced at the time.
@@sinisterthoughts2896 imagine a Winchester modified to take a full-on rifle cartridge like 30 odd 6 made of modern materials..... Winchester announced that they were modernizing the lever action concept and started making modern versions that you can dress up to look Tactical.....
America may have been isolated, or not up on technology, might not have had there military fully equipped, might have been a new country, but that was way back when....... Look at us now. . . we are not only on top of the list, we own the dam list now.
America, kicking ass and taking names. . all other countries talk a good talk.... but scared shitless of the big dog, though so many countries try hard to fight for the second spot, American's know, if ya can't shit, get off the pot
Cool
They're finally eating spaghetti with ketchup.
As an owner of a Carcano M91/24, Carcano was a way better gun designer than he gets credit for in the US. All the guns he made are simple to tear down and fix, as God intended for military issue rifles. My only complaint about them is the M91 sights are weird to my American eyes. Otherwise the engineering is very good for an infantry rifle.
I am the only one thinking of Aldo Raine during this video ?
Gorlamee
After a year somebody gets it. GRATSEE
"Quirky and unusual"
Sir, that is why we're here watching.
I was hoping that the italians made some flachette rifles in pre ww2 era
10:15 bent needle kinda close xD
Ian, all in all I think you give the Italians too much credit for choosing to convert their old rifles instead of investing in a new one. The cost was of paramount importance, I believe that was the preeminent factor in choosing not to adopt Carcano's own design for a brand-new (and reportedly competitive) rifle. Sure, you are correct in saying that in ten years it would've been obsolete by the adoption of metallic cartridges, but the government officials and military officers who adopted this decision were not prophets.
in fact the first proposal of Carcano was about a metallic cartridge conversion, but it was deemed too costy
These are the rifles they carried when they stampeded the Vatican.
Kinky...
😍