Hiram Maxim’s Rifle
Patented in May 1885, Sir Hiram Maxim’s rifle patent follows on from the filing of his machine gun patent in Britain in January 1884 and his April 1884 US patent for a recoil operated lever action rifle.
It would appear that Maxim was just as interested in producing other weapons as he was machine guns because during the same period he began working on a self-loading pistol design. All of the designs used variations of Maxim’s toggle-lock action. In the patent drawings the outline of the toggle joint can be see showing the position the toggle descends to when the rifle cycles.
Maxim’s rifle includes a single stack box magazine which appears to be holding six rounds of .450/577. While it does not appear to be detachable in his patent Maxim notes that “my improved rifle may be adapted for use with a Lee, Mannlicher, or other magazine.” He notes that the rifle is shown with a Mannlicher-style magazine.
The position of the trigger up under the receiver does not appear to be very ergonomic but the receiver appears to be quire narrow. The rifle also has a bolt hold open catch, shown in fig.4, which is described by the patent as a means of preventing the rifle to operate, as a safety feature. One interesting feature of the rifle is its complex, multi-piece, trigger which has a number of toggle linkages to bring it into contact with the firing pin.
I’ve been unable to find any other reference to Maxim’s rifle design and it is unclear how far the rifle progressed and if prototypes were produced. Maxim spent several years working on pistol designs but they, like the rifle, never saw the development or success of Maxim’s machine guns.
Sources:
‘Magazine Fire Arm’, H.S. Maxim, 5 May, 1885, US #317162 (source)
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