#Historical Cold Stories##Those Things of the Republic of China##抗日战争 #
Box Gun Series XIX: A short biography of the Wincetta Company that produced the door-opening barge gun next to it
Among the imported box guns, they are mainly divided into three major manufacturers: the German Mauser original factory, the Spanish BH company, and the Spanish Wencetta company. Among them, the Spanish company Wincetta entered the market the last time, but later developed the best. Compared with Mauser, who became a subsidiary parts factory, and BH, which converted to bicycles and fitness equipment, Wenceta changed the "Astra" brand of the product to the name of the factory, which still occupies a place in the arms market.
The Wen family's barge shell gun in the Chinese market, first with its unique gun body left maintenance cover, won the nickname of "side door box", and later with the pin on the right side of the gun body, grabbed the nickname of "seven nail box", becoming a "red stick dragon head" of "left side open door right seven nails". In terms of cost performance, the "side door box gun" is the most suitable barge gun for China. In the next few days, Xiaobian will introduce this century-old store to you.
1. The Wincetta company, which started with a cottage, was anti-copycat
Compared to mausser the elder, which was founded in 1811, the company of Societa Uncetand Compania is not very old, and they were founded in July 1908 in Ébar, Spain, only a year before the Bess brothers founded in the same city. And one of the fundamental reasons why the Wen family can live so comfortably is that people are multi-faceted and have many fist products, unlike Bei's hanging on a tree in a shell gun.
In the beginning, the Wincetta Company was not a professional arsenal, and their initial business was not arms, but the sale of machinery and accessories. It was not until 1913 that the company moved to Guernica (Picasso's famous painting "Guernica"), after which the Wen family began mass production of firearms.
At that time, they did not have their own design ability, so they began to imitate like everyone else, anyway, the custom at that time was "a big copy of the world's article", the Wen family based on the famous Browning 1903 hammerless pistol (that is, the predecessor of the later Colt "horse brand pick"), manufactured their own "Victoria" pistol - but the Wen family did not copy it all, in order to save costs, they used their own design of safety slip safety device and built-in firing device, and applied for a patent.
It is also worth mentioning that at that time, Spanish companies copied Browning, and Wincetta was naturally no exception. In addition to copying the Browning M1903, they also copied the Browning M1906 Palm Ray, which was the kind that the Phoenix reporter lu had just picked up.
At the same time, another Spanish company, the Weapons Company llama-Gabilondo y Cia SA, also began to produce its own counterfeit version of Browning 1903, which it named ruby pistols – a word that means ruby, hence the ruby pistol. The so-called "Rupee" pistol, on the other hand, used the patented insurance and firing device owned by The Man of Wincetta.
2. A large family of horse brand pickers
Therefore, this Browning Master's M1903, which later became famous as the Horse Brand Pick, is actually a huge family of incomparably chaotic people, and its ethical relationship is so complex that it is enough to make a Qiong Yao version of the series. And the main members of his family, the basic relationship in this regard is as follows:
Daddy – This is at The Browning Master's House, the so-called M1903, which is a follow-up to the Gun Brand Braun 1900, but the Browning Master just designed it, and it has never been mass-produced.
The eldest son, the Colt family in the United States, bought drawings of browning M1903 and produced the Colt M1903 hammerless pistol based on the gourd painting scoop. This is the eldest son of the Ma family from Browning, the famous "Horse Brand Picker".
But at the same time, the Colt family has a son of their own: the Colt MM1903 has a hammer pistol. The brothers look like the same surname, but they are actually half-brothers.
The second son of the concubine, in the Belgian FN family, this Browning master sold two goods, changed the caliber of M1903 and sold it again, and the result was a half-brother FN1903.
Wild third son - in the Wencetta family in Spain, this is purely the Wen family's own drawing of the cottage, did not give the other family a dime as a father. And the mother's designer Pedro Carega also innovated on his own, engaged in his own insurance and firing device, which is the half-brother of the horse brand picker: the Spanish Wincetta "Victoria" pistol.
Wild Fourth Son - In the Gabilon house in Spain, his family is Browning's veteran counterfeiter, as long as Browning produces a new product, it will be able to find the wild version in his home. This time is no exception, but this time it is a modified version of Wincetta. So this is actually the half-brother of the wild third son: the Spanish Gabirondo "ruby" rupee pistol.
Well, don't try to figure out what kind of relationship they are, Xiaobian Chen Tianjin himself felt dizzy when he wrote it. It's just a boring and entertaining version of the dog blood story that copied each other and ended up in a mess.
3. The wild French tribe of the Horse Brand Picker Family "Three Iron" pistols
However, if you think that this is the end of the matter, it is too underestimated the degree of sullenness of the Spaniards. The father of the wild fourth son, the prodigal son Gabirondo, was in love with the romantic and amorous Frenchman, who sent his copycat ruby pistol to France to participate in the selection of the standard pistol, and successfully won the general election in May 1915, and won the heart of the French girl who was struggling, and obtained an indefinite order of 10,000 bottles per month.
And as the French retreated, their demand for orders quickly rose from 10,000 to 30,000 a month, and from 30,000 to 50,000 - as the saying goes, "only tired cows" ... Cough serious point, this section deleted 73 words. In short, no matter how capable this prodigal son is, he can't stop such a desperate quest. So this bottomless prodigal son came up with a riot - he asked the brothers for support! This Gabirondo signed 10 foundries in one go, ready to use the "wheel war" of 11 strong men to cope with the huge appetite of the French girls. And the original counterfeiter, the father of the wild third son, Wincetta, is also one of the 10 strong men who "helped".
At present, at the moment of huge profits, Lao Wen also has no scruples about any name ethics, and directly takes over the order and begins to produce all-out production, and has successively manufactured 150,000 ruby pistols. In the process of producing the gun, the Wen family also accumulated a lot of money and experience, and used the first bucket of gold earned to expand the scale of production, and also updated the production equipment, and its manufacturing level was also greatly improved. By the end of World War I, the Wen family was already one of the most popular manufacturers of light weapons in Spain.
It should be added that these 11 strong men still did not satisfy the appetite of the French, and finally signed up with her as many as 45 manufacturers, and the total output of each factory reached 710,000 - from the number of pistols alone, we can know how miserable France in World War I was. And because there are too many manufacturers, the quality is naturally uneven, so later after the gun was exported to China, the shoddy goods of some of the small factories were contemptuously called "three pieces of iron" because of the rough combination of sleeves, grips and gun bodies. And the famous horse brand pickle also has such a large number of wild French distant brothers with 45 fathers.
From the shining "ruby", Sheng Sheng made himself into "three pieces of iron", and it cannot be said that Gabirondo, the prodigal son, is really quite capable.
4. Eat all-in 9mm bullet fist products
Fast forward to 1919, and the Spanish military began looking for new pistols to replace the Campo-Giro pistol used during World War I. At that time, the Wen family's experience points were already full, so the designer Pedro Carri added a new product and competed in the name of the ASTRA 400. The gun features a unique blowback action structure, heavy action springs, and the hard, heavy-duty profile of the M1911, which is quite leathery and durable at first glance.
The biggest feature of this gun is that people are not picky eaters - the M400 can fire spanish 9×23mm Largo bullets, Austria's 9×23mm Steyr ammunition, Belgium's 9×20mm Browning long bullets and Germany's 9× 19mm Balabaerum bullets and other ammunition. However, when using short bullets such as 9× 19mm bullets, there may be problems with the second round of loading.
This can eat almost all 9mm bullets without changing parts, which was a unique trick in the world at that time - few guns can do it today! The Spanish military was therefore so pleased with it that it immediately adopted and gave the M1921 military designation. Because of its cylindrical front end of the sleeve, the appearance resembles cigar smoke, and it has been nicknamed "cigar pistol".
After this, in order to adapt to the civilian self-defense pistol market, the Wen family also developed a .32 ACP and .380 ACP bullet Astra 300 pistol. The gun is just over 6 inches long and weighs only 22 ounces, and the size and weight are basically the same as the most popular compact hand-in-hand guns such as the Sig 365, Springfield Hellcat, Glock 43, and so on. It can be said that it is a self-defense pistol ahead of its time. The gun sold quickly, producing more than 108,000 units.
And the reason why there is so much wordiness is because the small editor Chen Tianjing wants to tell everyone: This Wen family is really technologically advanced, and the business is booming, and people have money and some fist products. To tell the truth, according to The status of Wenseta at that time, according to the reason, it is really not necessary to do those counterfeit things, let alone go to the muddy water of the "cottage version of the box cannon".