Flare gun - Forgotten Weapons

Czechoslovakian Flare Pistols: vz 44/67 and vz 44/81

September 12, 2025 Ian McCollum 12

In 1951, Czechoslovakia received the technical data package for the Soviet SPSh flare pistol. This was a simple single shot break-action 26.5mm signal flare launcher, and they put it into production from 1952 through 1958. […]

British Cabin Pressure Flare Pistols (Quite Unusual)

October 8, 2018 Ian McCollum 8

These two flare pistols (Mark 2 and Mark 1) are being sold by Morphys on October 31, 2018. Signal flares were an important communications tool for aircraft during World War Two, and a multitude of […]

Origin of a Flare Pistol: Shpagin’s SPSh-44

June 7, 2018 Ian McCollum 2

This flare pistol is coming up for sale at RIA on June 23. After finishing his work on the PPSh-41 submachine gun, Georgiy Semyonovich Shpagin was tasked with creating a simplified flare or signal pistol […]

Japanese Army 35mm Type 10 Flare Pistol

November 19, 2017 Ian McCollum 12

The Japanese Army and Navy of the 1920s and 30s often used quite different equipment, and had a substantial interservice rivalry. Flare guns were one example of this separation, with the services using not just […]

Japan’s Type 90 3-Barreled Naval Flare Pistol

November 14, 2017 Ian McCollum 3

The Japanese Navy used several different types of flare pistols during World War Two (and in the decades before), but the most impressive looking of the bunch was the three-barreled Type 90 (not to be confused […]

Gebrüder Rempt Four-Barrel Enormous Flare Pistol

September 6, 2017 Ian McCollum 26

In 1917, the German military issued a contract for the construction of 2500 of these unique and impressive 4-barreled flare launchers. They were manufactured by 7 different companies (this example being from Gebrüder Rempt), and […]

Massive Wheellock Hand Mortars at James D Julia

April 8, 2017 Ian McCollum 13

These wheellock hand mortars, or katzenkopf, are an example of a weapon made and used for everything from front line military application to civilian parades to simple decoration. The pair we are looking at today […]

Manville Gas Gun Video

October 29, 2012 Ian McCollum 10

Charles Manville developed this weapon in the 1930s as a riot control tool, and they were built in 12ga, 25mm, and 37mm. We should point out that the 12ga version was for tear gas rounds […]