Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Slightly obscure and quirky, but excellent handguns...

One I've never owned or shot, but always thought would be neat was the Gyro Jet.....if (and that would be a BIG if) you could find ammo.

I have owned one of those but never shot it...bought it at a gun show in Tucson on Sat and sold it on Sunday for a nice profit...ugly gun but has potential

I got to fire one round thru a GyroJet Carbine in 1988. Then shootable ammo was approx 20.00 per round. The rocket motor sputtered...then really got going...problem was by then it was courseing its way thru a dry field while skipping across the ground...took all of us over an hour to knock the little fires down....

It was made to say the least, as cheaply as possible. If you look the frame is all riveted stamping... It is neat but no target gun. It was made for an outdoorsman to have something inexpensive and reliable to finish off trapped animals and informal plinking...fills the bill. A few come up for sale on GunBroker every year... Depending on condition and if it has the original box and holster $150-300.00.

I think I had one of those Berettas in .22. Was that the one with interchangeable barrels...4" and 6"...magazine release on the left grip panel? Good shooter. I have a Cheetah .22 now..great gun...

Bob

I wonder if you could adapt model rocket engines to a GJ cartridge? Hmmm...

I'd have to vote for the Dardick, an open breech, magazine fed, double action revolver with interchangeable barrels chambered for .38 Dardick (actually 9mm) .30 caliber, and .22 caliber. Using triangular plastic cartridges it was an amazing handgun. A carbine was also produced, as was a flechette firing version that was (briefly) developed for the military by H&R.

Yep, there was also a Mk V model, a "Lawman", and "Whitetailer" variants

here's a photo of the lockwork on mine. As you can see, a V-leaf main spring

Shot a P7 just the other day. My son has one.

Quite nice firearms. In fact if I saw one in reasonable condition at a reasonable price, I'd buy it.

Never seen a Sheridan.
Is it single shot?

Gyro Jet!
I forgot about those.
Who was it... Dean Martin who played a spy that carried one?

I had a Star PD .45acp for a few years. Light to carry, reliable (had the feed ramp polished), but a handful with hardball ammo.

Ohhh Fantastic gun...only problem was it had a bastard magazine....in my opinion should of been a colt 1911 based mag then it would of been near perfect

Yep,

Expensive magazine and the recoil buffer was an annoyance. But if you didn't have it, you'd beat the frame to death. The great thing about PD's is they're typically cheap; lot of gun for not a lot of money. Love those Spanish guns.

Yes, tip-up barrel single shot....Bob

Sounds like you got your moneys worth, would not have been near as memorable for everyone if you shot it and it just punched a hole in a target before disappearing.

Agree with the P7 PSP, one of my favorites.

Also have a Broomhandle Mauser - what a neat mechanism! A pistol with no pins and only one screw - the grip screw! Disassembles like a 3-D jigsaw puzzle.

And considering what an early semi-auto pistol design it was, they work VERY well. If your broomhandle is all up to spec, and so is your ammo, a malfunction is a very rare thing; even in the mud and muck.

The locking block on those can sometimes become brittle, leading to a scary situation, because it's the only thing keping the bolt from coming back at your face. I've seen more than a few broken locking blocks, yet I've never heard of anyone actually have one fail while shooting.

Still, they are VERY cool pistols; really cool piece of history.

I was always nervous shooting a gun that came apart to the rear....I am just saying....I always put new springs and good blocks in them before shooting....

the H&K P9S was a bit out of the ordinary... i carried one over a lot of the planet... it was the best handling and most intuitive DA pistol i've ever known of...

1907 Savage pocket automatic.

Ridiculously ahead of its time and their workmanship is second to none. The slide rails run inside the frame like a SIG and the seam between the slide and frame is barely noticable. It uses a 10 shot staggered magazine,...in 1907. I bought one of a whim one day back a few years ago, took it home, field stripped it, and and was amazed at the depth of manufacturing skill that was demonstrated in it.

Back in the days when it was introduced, the Colt pocket auto was its contemporary, and although costing significantly more money, the Savage handily outsold the Colt.

Time has pushed it aside, but it was and *is* a very premium piece of work, in engineering, fit and finish and ergonomics.