The Worlds Most Powerful Handgun
The worlds most powerful handgun is the Austrian Pfeifer-Zeliska .600 Nitro Express Magnum. It is chambered to fire the British developed .600 caliber rifle bullet. This revolver is custom made.
If you would like one then contact Pfeifer arms ( url near bottom of page ) and they will make one for you. Priced at 13,840 Euro's. This equates as $17,316* or £11,722* including Tax ( *at Exchange rate as of 20 November 2008 ) very expensive, but very exclusive though.
The Pfeifer Revolver is also available chambered for the .458 Winchester Magnum.
The image below shows the colossal size of the revolver
This is not a joke. This gun really exists.
Because of its size the Pfeifer-Zeliska .600 Nitro Express Magnum would really be required to be fired whilst resting on a bench clamp or small sand bags as shown in the image below.
The gun weighs in at total of 13.23lbs and is heavy enough to absorb most of the violent recoil.
The recoil is not uncontrollable, but instead, tamed by the guns weight.
The .600 Nitro Express cartridge was originally developed in 1899 for big game hunters, even though Holland & Holland no longer manufacture these cartridges, they can still be sought through the gun trade, small reloading companies or even over the internet.
One company still actually make these rounds and they are Kynoch at www.kynochusa.com
A .600 Nitro Express cartridges are about $40 each !
With a Bullet Weight of 900 grains and a muzzle velocity 1950 fps, it produces muzzle energy of 7591 ft/lbs or 3½ tons! the Pfeifer- Zeliska .600 Nitro Express Magnum is 8 times more powerful than a Smith and Wesson.44 magnum and 3 times more powerful than the Smith and Wesson .50 Magnum.
The 'Mag-Port' recoil compensation holes can be seen at the business end of the barrel, it reduces the back pressure enough to lower the recoil to an acceptable degree.
The cartridges are loaded through a 'gate' on the right side of the cylinder housing, the spent cartridge cases are also ejected through this gate, by pushing back the extractor rod. The ejector rod has a stroke of 170mm and pushes the 76mm long Nitro Express cases out 60mm from the back of the cylinder leaving 17mm of the case still in the chamber, enough for them to be extracted by hand.
The gun is made from super hard 42CrMo4 Tungsten steel and can withstand the gas pressure up to 2500 BAR without a hitch. The empty cylinder weighs a massive 4.5lb on its own.
The hammer, extractor, knock-out cylinder bar, screws and the cylinder central pivot are all gold plated.
Also on the right lower sides of the gun, the inscriptions are gold filled. The inscriptions read, 'MOD. ZELISKA CAL. 600 NE', on the left side the manufacturer's address 'K. PFIEFER WAFFEN, FELDKIRCH, AUSTRIA'.
Most of the guns metal work was made on conventional milling and drilling machines, then each part was finished to a very high standard.
Click the picture to go to the Austrian Pfeifer custom gun website.
Its a very impressive revolver, a revolver that truly is the Worlds Most Powerful...EVER !
But its not alone...
...The Thomson Contender 'Encore' .600 Nitro Express Magnum is a single shot target pistol, its very light and dangerously uncontrollable when fired.
A nice looking pistol, but looks can be deceptive !
The recoil in such a relatively light gun at 6lbs can in fact throw the pistol out of your hands as the picture below testifies. I have painted a yellow arrow that points at the Thomson Contender .600 Nitro Express, (its the blurry grey object ) as it flies over the Gents head !
It could have smashed him in the face ...he was lucky !
All handgun bullets can never be as powerful as when fired through a rifle, and the .600 Nitro Express is then even more powerful.
56K Modem Version Normal version click HERE