Chaineux Pinfire Revolver

About the Chaineux Pinfire Revolver

The Chaineux Pinfire Revolver is a 19th-century Belgian high-capacity revolver built around the Lefaucheux pinfire cartridge. Designed by the Liège gunmaker Joseph-Lambert Chaineux, it is distinguished by a hollowed-out cylinder whose centre retains only a tube for the cylinder pin, leaving an annular space that allowed unusually large numbers of chambers to be packed into a single cylinder. Specimens are documented with 10 and 12 chambers, with rare 20- and 30-shot examples also known. A single-action design fired by a hammer striking the protruding pin of each cartridge, it was typically chambered in 7mm, 9mm and 11mm pinfire and finished with intricate engraving on the action, cylinder and barrel.

Chaineux's signature trick was to hollow out the centre of the cylinder so that only a thin tube remained for the axis pin, freeing an annular ring of metal for extra chambers. This let him crowd ten, twelve, twenty and even thirty pinfire rounds into a single cylinder at a time when most revolvers held six, making his guns curiosities of mid-19th-century firepower.

Chaineux Pinfire Revolver specifications

Two gunmakers carried the Chaineux name; this entry covers Joseph-Lambert Chaineux of Liège, registered at the proof house from 1864 to 1884. Dimensions and chamber counts varied widely; the 9mm 10-shot configuration is taken as representative. Early models used a hanging extractor that fouled in holsters, later replaced by a guided extractor. Surviving examples are very rare.