A. W. Schwarzlose Berlin

nononsense

June 18, 2005 09:26

From my files:

Known as "STANDART" pistol, this rare selfloading handgun was a design of ANDREAS WILHELM SCHWARZLOSE (1867 - 1936), born in Prussia (later Germany), resident of Berlin, although mentioned sometimes incorrectly as an Austrian, because of his first really successful invention, machine gun Modell 1907, was adopted first in Austro-Hungarian Empire. Standart or Military pistol was patented first in Britain (as usual in those days. Br. Pat. N:r. 1934, registration date 23rd April 1898). Patent drawing of the Standart pistol shows an accelerator lever, similar to that of Finnish LAHTI L-35 pistol (it's "Achillean Heel"). Schwarzlose Standart pistol prototypes were designed to shoot 7.65 x 25 mm BORCHARDT cartridges, but the accelerator was omitted from the actually producted pistols - at least from majority of them.

Drawing from British Patent N:r. 1934/ 1898. The accelerator lever is present on Fig. 2 (above trigger) in it's rearmost position. It was actually neither needed nor adopted to the Schwarzlose Standart pistols shooting cartridges more powerful than those loaded for 7.65 x 25 mm Borchardt. From the production pistols M-1898 was also omitted a projecting cocking handle on the left side of a breech-bolt (Fig. 4 and 5), which was seemingly copied from Borchardt C-93 pistol.

When the breech-bolt was blown back after unlocking by residual powder gas pressure only, it was possible to shoot also more heavily loaded 7.63 x 25 mm MAUSER cartridges from Standart pistol. I recommend, however, use of handloads with slighty reduced charges; about "Suggested Starting Loads" of .30 Mauser cartridges. Don't risk your valuable collector's item by shooting with 7.62 mm Tokarev factory-loaded ammo. Especially Czech loads are very strong medicine! Price of a Schwarzlose Standart pistol in "safe shootable condition" is today $ US 5.000+. You seemingly didn't know, what a treasure you're possessing. If your pistol is in "mint" condition, value of it may be as high as $ 7.500 or still higher.

Most probable country where one can meet today a "for sale" Standart pistol is Russia! Total number of produced pistols is unknown. They were offered for sale in Germany, England and United States, but a small manufacture "A.W. SCHWARZLOSE G.m.b.H. BERLIN" was unknow, while LUDWIG LOEWE/ D.W.M. (manufacturer of BORCHARDT C-93 pistols) and WAFFENFABRIK MAUSER were well-known big industrial companies. They offered selfloading pistols about similar to Standart for sale. They had a lot more production and sales (read: advertisement and bribing) capacity than newcomer Schwarzlose. Big competitors, especially Mauser, had the "battle proven" pistol in production especially after the end of South-African Boer War (1899 - 1902).

Boers bought a lot of their military firearms from Germany, especially from Waffenfabrik Mauser (but the feared 37 mm MAXIM machine cannons; "POM-POM guns"; from England!). Mauser pistols were noted because of their hailstorm-like firepower and 7 mm Mauser rifles due to their almost incredible long-range accuracy. (Fire of the British attackers fell usually short, because they shot hollow-pointed "Dum-Dum" bullets, while sights of their rifles were adjusted for shooting with heavier solid-pointed roundnosed projectiles). A.W. Schwarzlose was able to sell just a small lot of Standart pistols to Boers before the end of South-African War, but a couple of years later his company was able to trade a lot of thousand pistols to Imperial Russia. Not to Russian Army, Navy, Police, Ohrana (predecessor of KGB) or Gendarmery, but to the left wing of Russian Social-Democratic Party, which was preparing to insurrection in late 1904 or early 1905. These pistols were confiscated at Russian border and issued to the Imperial Russian Frontier Guards.

Construction of Standart M-98 pistol is ingenious: Number of the parts is tried to keep minimum. Examples given: The recoil spring acts also as a mainspring (just like in a later F.N./ Browning Model 1899/1900) and the sear acts also as the extractor of empty cases. Standart M-98 pistol also looks like a military pistol; not the disassembled pistol-carbine like a clumsy Borchardt C-93 or Mauser C-96, designed for use with the shoulder-stock, and as a handgun just in the grave emergency.

Standart M-98 pistol was designed for use as a true handgun; no more as a surrogate autoloader carbine. Frontmost lever on the left side is a safety. Positions of it are "SAFE" downwards and "FIRE" upwards. Rearmost lever is a hold-open catch ("setting lever") of a breech-block, which keep the bolt in it's rear position during removal of an empty magazine and insertion of a filled clip. Pistol is cocked on the picture. Note a prominently extruding rear end of a striker; easy to see and feel. Thumb of a shooter is pushing the safety lever to "FIRE" position, and the forefinger is away from the trigger. (Source: Engraved illustration from the Schwarzlose manual, published in 1901).

Functioning of M-98 is as follows, according to EDWARD C. EZELL: "It was not only quite modern in appearance but also very advanced in concept. It is of technical interest because of its rotary-locked breech mechanism, which consisted of three main assemblies - barrel and barrel extension, bolt, and frame (receiver). Barrel and barrel extension were machined from a single piece. Below the octagonal REINFORCE section of the barrel, there was a rectangular section that rode in a track in the frame and housed the barrel returning spring. The barrel extension was at the breech end of the barrel, which was cut to receive four lugs of the bolt. The bolt group consisted of the bolt, striker and spring, and the one-piece sear extractor.

About 25 millimeters in diameter at its largest point, this essentially cylindrical bolt had four locking lugs that matched locking recesses in the barrel extension. Interior of the bolt had been bored out to an interior diameter 17.5 millimeters, which resulted in a relatively light weight and provided room for the striker and combination striker-recoil spring. On the bolt bottom was a slot, helical at the rear for about 25 millimeters and then straight for 50 millimeters, that provided the necessary rotation for the bolt to unlock it from it from the barrel extension. The striker was a very large piece, 120 millimeters long, which in the cocked position was held to the rear by combination sear-extractor, a right-angled bell crank lever that floated in a vertical slot in the forward portion of the striker when the bolt and striker were moving.

The receiver group housed all the non-reciprocating parts of the pistol. It is noteworthy that Schwarzlose included only four springs in the pistol - the receiver-mounted magazine catch spring, the barrel return spring, the bolt & striker spring, and the rear sight spring. Rotation of the bolt was accomplished by the cam slot on the bolt moving along a cam-receiver ring at the rear of receiver. That ring rode inside the bolt while its rectangular stalk guided the cam slot in the bolt. When the Standart was fired, the barrel and bolt assemblies recoiled in reaction to the bullet's flight down the barrel. After traveling 19 millimeters, the barrel was stopped by the full compression of the spring beneath it. Meanwhile, the bolt had rotated through 45 degrees counter-clockwise. Having rotated 45 degrees, the bolt was free to continue rearwards for 50 millimeters, the barrel assembly, powered by its compressed recoil spring, returned forwards for 4.8 millimeters until it was caught by the barrel HOLDER (catch).

Ejection of the fired cartridge occurred toward the end of recoil cycle when a lug on the bolt actuated the ejector. On the return stroke, the bolt was propelled by the return spring. Traveling forwards, the bolt stripped the next cartridge from magazine, fed it into the chamber and then rotated shut. In the process of rotation, the cylindrical section of the bolt depressed the rear of the barrel catch, thus permitting the locked bolt and barrel assemblies to continue their forward travel. The striker was held in the cocked position by the combination of sear-extractor." (Quotation from a book "HANDGUNS OF THE WORLD" by E.C.EZELL (C) 1981. Published by the permission of it's author and publisher, ARMS AND ARMOUR PRESS).

Parts of Schwarzlose pistol M-1898. Nomenclature of them is somewhat archaic, because this picture is 100+ years old. (Source: Schwartzlose catalog in English; 1901).

I have never seen the pistol M-98, but I tried to illustrate it to the Finnish book "ARMA FENNICA Vol.2; SOTILASASEET", printed in 1987. (Nowadays presumably out of print).
Fig 1: Partial cut-away of the Schwarzlose pistol Model 1898.
Fig 2: Rear view of the receiver. Please note: The "retraction ears" of the bolt may be shorter than those on the picture.
Fig 3: Rear end of the handle frame.
Fig 4: Locking/ unlocking slot of the bolt.
Fig 5: "BANG!" Although the tubular breech-bolt of pistol model 1898 is light, the bolt of Mauser C-96 is still less heavy. It is "hugaa" ("bullpoop") to say that Schwarzlose Modell 1898 is unable to stand 7.93 x 25 mm cartridges, but the old iron may be somewhat fatigued. If you shoot, use handloaded cartridges loaded to generate marginally reliable automatic functioning.
(Copyright of drawing: P.T.KEKKONEN (C) 1986).

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS OF SCHWARZLOSE PISTOL M-1898

Caliber.................... 7.63 x 25 mm Mauser
Overall length................. 273 millimeters
Barrel length..................163 millimeters
Weight (with empty magazine)......... 785 grams
Rifling......4 grooves, clockwise, twist 240 mm
Operation method........semi-long barrel recoil
Locking method.........rotating bolt, four lugs
Magazine capacity...............7 cartridges *)

*) That's why the Imperial German armed forces were never interested in M-1898 pistol despite of its advanced technology: The High Brass of German Army had a "fix id?" that a minimum magazine capacity of an autoloading pistol should be at least eight rounds of ammo.

BALLISTICS OF CONTEMPORARY CARTRIDGES (in 1899)

Pistol STANDART M-98 BORCHARDT C-93 MAUSER C-96

Cartridge 7.63 x 25 mm 7.65 x 25 mm 7.63 x 25 mm
Bullet weight 5.50 grams 5.5 - 5.6 g 5.0 - 6.0 g
Velocity m/sec. 450*) 385**) 443**)
Energy, Joules 550*) 406**) 539**)

*) Muzzle velocity and energy. (Note also the barrel length).
**) Velocity and energy at distance 5 meters from the muzzle.

Cartridges shot from M-98 and C-93 were same D.W.M. (headstamp "403") loads with a bullet weight 5.5 grams and maximum allowed chamber pressure 2600 atmospheres. All the listed cartridges have very same dimensions despite of nominally .02 mm bigger caliber of Borchardt C-93 pistols. The overall length of 7.65 x 25 mm cartridge was also 2 mm shorter than 7.63 mm Mauser or 7.62 mm Tokarev cartridges. Bullet diameter was and is same in all of these cartridges, and so is also the usual bullet weight 5.5 grams, with a more recent exception: Czechian M-48 ammo, designed for submachine guns and CZ Wzor 1952 pistols (only). Measured muzzle velocity of its bullet is 500 meters per second from the CZ Model 1952 pistol.

PS. Digital photos are welcome to us. I can estimate real value of your Modell 1898 pistol more exactly if I can see even the appearance of it. There are collectible firearms in "mint" condition, in "relic" condition, and in (at least) five condition classes between these extremes. Even the pistol in "relic" condition may be valuable, if it is a rare model. And your Schwarzlose Standart M-98 is truly a "rara avis".

http://guns.connect.fi/gow/QA17.html

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rufe-snow

June 18, 2005 13:34

This is the pistol your inquiring about.

It's the only "blow-forward" pistol to attain commerical success. They were made for a short period of time in Germany prior to the First World War. Warner Arms Co. of New York was the U.S. distributor. After production ceased in Germany, Warner assembled some pistols from the remaining parts and sold them in the U.S.

The mechanism of your pistol is very unique. I don't know how many were made, or the number in the U.S., but you have a true collectors item.

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captkirk3@dslextreme.com

June 18, 2005 13:37

All my database says is; Schwarzlose- Pistol and machine gun manufacturer in Linsenplatz, Germany, c.1911-27...Looks like Nononsense has given the History and more....My sugestion to You is to Download it for future referance...I know I am....!

Captain Kirk, Tech Staff

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nononsense

June 18, 2005 14:22

Thanks rufe-snow, you'd think that I could read and punch the right buttons by now... jeez... I guess I was trying to get it done too fast.

Best.

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larr-larr

June 18, 2005 22:13

Rufe-show found the right gun and Nononsense followed with the drawing of it. You guys are the best. I will email you photos of the gun so you can see the condition. I think you will be pleased. Now if I can figure out how to take it apart.

Larry

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A. W. Schwarzlose Berlin

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