Today's collaboration with What is it? blog brings us this strange looking tool - can you guess what it is? More clues and another photo at What is it? blog.
Place your guess in the comment section, but please post no URLs - let others play! No prize this week, you're playing for bragging rights only.
Technically, no one got it right, but there are a couple of good guesses (booby trap, trip wire gun) and one really close one (gopher trap). Here's the answer:
Anti-rodent device or mouse killer pistol, invented in 1862. To operate: Pull back the hammer and insert the safety, place a percussion cap on the nipple, load 10 grains of black powder into the barrel along with some paper wadding, put some peanut butter on the bottom of the trigger, place the device in a good location, set the sear, and finally, remove the safety.
sorry for my poor english
morse code thingy?
its a telegraph device!!!
(I actually like the booby trap answer better, but I got beaten to that).
(sorry about my bizarre english)
It's gotta be a banana.
Thus, this is quite obviously a percussion lock for a firearm or similar device. I've never seen one of this overall configuration before. Perhaps it is for use on a small artillery piece.