Popular Science Monthly
��79
��Taking the Staccato Bark Out of the Machine Cun
THE machine gun, properly hidden, makes its presence known only by a light blue vapor that is visible under certain conditions during firing, and by its noise, which is precisely that of the common pneumatic riveter used on structural steel buildings. At times the roar of firing, covers up this peculiar, harsh, regular, mechanical "Tat-tat-tat- tat" — but unless the firing is heavy the other side speedily recognizes the dis- tinctive sound and looks for the gun. Can't the gun be silenced?
The most practical way of silencing firearms is to use Maxim's device, which consists of a steel cylinder larger than the barrel, at- tached to the muzzle of the gun. Inside the cylinder are steel disks set at a slight pitch, and with a hole pierced through them to permit the passage of the bullet. The gases, emerg- ing under high pressure, expand into the silencer and are set to whirling, los- ing their mo- mentum and much of their pressure and
entering the air without causing a noise at the end of their whirling.
While the Maxim silencer is entirely efficient, it is doubtful if it could be ap- plied to the machine gun, because the firing of six hundred shots a minute would result in loading the cylinder with the gas from another charge before the first had escaped, and wrecking the silencer from the intense pressure.
The Italians are said to have machine guns that make merely a low, dull thud instead of the revealing crackle.
���The noise of a gion, contrary to common belief, is not something within the barrel, but merely the violent slap of gases at high speed and pressure, impinging on the air at the muzzle. A silencer whirls these gases
��An American Fortune Spent for An English Invention
THAT there is just as great an oppor- tunity for the inventor as there ever was, is vividly illustrated in the case of Frank Hornby, of Liverpool, England. Who has not seen the advertisements in nearly every American periodical of the mechanical toy, with which boys can build structures resembling bridges, buildings, derricks or ships? That toy is Hornby's invention —patented by him sixteen years ago and first thought of in 1899.
Hornby has a mechanical turn of mind. As a boy he was familiar with tools. It was for the two boys in his own family that he constructed the first early models of his toy. Finally, in 1901, he
obtained his patent. There was nothing resembling it on the mar- ket. However, the trade did not enthuse over it. Horn- by was work- ing on a small salary in those days, and thus could not spend money for advertis- ing. Fortu- nately, how- ever, his em- ployer be- came interest- ed and assist- ed him in bringing the clever, new toy to the attention of the public.
Seven years after he obtained his patent, $40,000 had been expended in exploiting the toy. Still a market had not been created. But Hornby did not lose his enthusiasm. The next year, 1909, the toy came to America and thereafter Hornby came into the fortune that was rightly his. During the first year a business of $7,000 was done in this country alone. The following year it jumped to $24,000. In 1911 it climbed to $49,000 and in 1912 it touched $114,000.
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