What is the rarest firearm you have seen someone with at the range?

[red_zr24x4]

Goes through money faster than Lamar Odum at a high end strip club.

You never cease to amaze me Leadeye

 

[flylo]

It wasn't at a range but I held & carried the 3rd & 4rh most valuable firearms in the world. I set up 2 Rotary meetings with the Berrien County Sherrif dept as they have the 2 Tommy guns used in the St Valantines day massacre. One with a stick mag, one with a 50 rd drum. That was before the sory went on TV several places. I carried both outside to the debuties car after the programs & everyone getting their pictures with them. I had broken my back but was thinking all the time, wish I could run like I used too.

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

My wife's Charles Lancaster 14 gauge, 1860. One of the first cartridge guns. Notice the similar action to the percussion gun below. They were still working these things out. You must have hammers at half cock when closing the breech, or the non-rebounding pins will cause...an accident.



I have a Westley Richards. 15 Oct, 1879 per the factory ledger. This is one of the first guns using the Anson and Deeley boxlock patent, now standard. Its patent use number is stamped on the action, auth number 1518. Started in 1812, by 1879 they'd just reached SN 5400, about 80 guns a year. They now make about 30 guns a year.





Belgian cape gun, 1853-1860. 18 gauge next to .40 cal

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

Underlever 16 gauge Lefaucheux style with UK import proofs.


S&W Triple Lock



Inglis Hi Power with stock, Nationalist Chinese contract



Thieme and Schlegelmilch drilling through outfitter Robert Faller, Freiburg, about 1912. 16 gauge over 8X58R Sauer

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

S&W 3rd model .44 American. 3 digit SN under #350


Stemple Suomi SMG


Commission sporter by Haenel, with double set triggers and express sights



Cape gun, German, about 1800, flint converted to percussion. 24 gauge

View attachment _D6A1949.JPG

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

Wife's Dreyse sideswing needlefire 16 gauge





Lefaucheux 1858 pinfire 12mm converted to centerfire and engraved



including original 1858 Remington, an 1863 Colt factory converted to .38 rimfire, a .32 S&W with a SN below #150, a model 1917 S&W in 98% condition with original lanyard, and a bizarre Belgian revolver in 8mm French with Persian script about the Ottoman emperor

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

Someone mentioned flamethrower?

 

[Gunsmiff12B]

Not mine but I was appraising a collection and they had some pretty rare stuff in it. To include a colt python California combat, 1 of 200 and some other colts still in the factory boxes from 1934

 

[farmdog]

Phillips & Rodgers M47 Medusa with a 4 inch barrel is probably the most rare modern firearm that I have fired.

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

Closeup of the 1863 Colt



.44 Automag



And the 1917 Smith

 

[BGDave]

Closeup of the 1863 Colt

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.44 Automag

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And the 1917 Smith

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WOW...You should post more often. Those firearms are like walking into a time capsule.

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

W&C Scott & Sons, 10 gauge, 1873ish.

Scott patented the tumbler latch, now standard for most break action shotguns. This one is early enough to have the patent number on it.

View attachment _DSC2687.JPG

View attachment _DSC2693.JPG

 

[BigRed]

Mine is a HiPower. I never seem to see any other HiPowers at the range, and I can't remember ever running into someone carrying one.

I was carrying one all day.

 

[jbombelli]

I was carrying one all day.


View attachment 142441

Nice! But I didn't run into you.

 

[BigRed]

Nice! But I didn't run into you.

How do you know?

LOL!

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

Henri Pieper, Belgium. 1883. Diana 10 gauge. Pieper is probably the greatest gun designer most people have never heard of. That monobloc right there? His design and patent, now standard. He invented a machine to forge damascus barrels for more consistency. When smokeless propellant came along, he offered a $10,000 (1890 $$) for anyone who could burst his guns with modern shells. Eventually became one of the founders of FN. This thing is a tank, even after 140 years. Mirror bright bores, wall thickness of .050" (minimum safe is considered .020"). Breech .2" and a bit. Slams shut like a bank vault. Antiaircraft artillery for geese.

His son invented the Bayard .32, 1908, which was the smallest, lightest .32 until the Kel Tec came along.

 

[Jaybird1980]

I have thought about this and I think I would have to say a Liberator is the rarest gun I have seen and fired at a range.


The others I was thinking could be a 458 Lott double rifle, or an 8 guage shotgun. I think the Liberator is probably the rarest.

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

Girlfriend's Browning Double auto.

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My Grendel P12 .380, double stack 11 round.



I built one of Ed Hubel's 12 Gauge Rifles From Hell

View attachment Eject1.JPG

 

[MichaelZWilliamson]

M1D Sniper rifle with M84 scope


1944 Winchester Model 12 trench gun



Japanese Type 97 sniper rifle with scope and case

 

[mike4]

I've seen a wide range of older less common NFA items at the range, so sticking to those I've actually fired on the range it would be an HK SP89 when they first came in given the numbers were limited, and several HK MP5 including transferable conversions and factory originals although those are not all that rare.

Most rare items I handled but did not fire are a KAC prototype belt-fed based on the Stoner 63, and an actual VN-era SEAL Stoner belt-fed.