100 Years From Now

I can see possible advancements in bullets more than guns, but everyone keeps making bullets. I think a lot will depend on the movement of the gun laws both here and around the world as to what will be availible. For instance, SBRs might become really popular if they were easier to get, seems like an ideal weapon for home defense, add some kits to readily convert your pistol to a SBR when you get home?? How nice would that be?

I can't see the 1911 going anywhere. It is never thought of as an "antiquated" design despite the face that the original design is 100 years old. I do see a possible trend either toward lighter or heavier weapons. IE, more plastic guns or more steel guns.

Then safety designs and new features...
Fingerprint readers on the trigger?
"jiggle" stabilizers
Perhaps some new reloading mechanism to replace standard magazines that is faster and easier?
Slide racking piston on an electric button?

Only time will tell.

The M1911 is going nowhere. The Glock is going nowhere. The now-famous and popular designs will likely still be here.

I just got an idea for a new invention, tee hee.

I figure caseless ammo.

Probably electronic ignition. You should be able to get a trigger that would be amazing when it doesn't have to do mechanical work.

Better sights of some kind. We've come a long way in sights over the last few decades and we are spending a lot of money in research on it. When you go back and look at the sights on an old government issue 1911 you can see how far we have come even for the most conservative of members here. My guess is where we are now with holographic sights is just the beginning. I think the military is going to drive all this.

I think that revolvers and semi autos will both be completely made of a type of polymer. Including the slide, or cylinder and barrel.

I can see electric ignition coming along at sometime in semi-auto/full auto rifles. I know all of the aircraft 6 barrel machine guns made in the past 40 years are electrically fired primers. Only problem is static electricity can set them off.

If we're still able to shoot at all and lasers, deathrays or some other development hasn't replaced our current style of ammo I can see some of the classics still being shot and perhaps even still being made.

I would not be at all surprised if 1911's are still being made.

Similarly folks that shoot SA revolvers are not about the latest and greatest. The LIKE shooting a classic design. So I don't doubt that SA revolvers will still be around. Besides I don't see the fun of cowboy action shooting going away any time soon.

Folks will still enjoy shooting black powder guns for the historical connection. So no changes from the current reproductions there either. Such guns will still be made from all the proper materials and to the original designs.

But what about the polymer guns? I can see some folks collecting the old ones. But I seriously doubt that Glock or whoever will still be making a "classic" line of 100 year old models like S&W is doing with their revolvers. Seems like poly gun owners are all about the lastest and greatest. Just having seen the Glock faithful drool over the Gen 4 guns and begin trading up seems to bear witness to this idea.

Likely the then current "modern" guns will be shooting caseless ammo which is either electrically fired or still fired with a primer but which is self consumning during the burn.

One aspect I wonder about is if we'll see actual rail gun "rifles". With battery technology advancing and with some other developments we may well see the use of shoulder braced rail guns shooting bullets without the need for cases, powder or primers. It may be a bit of a reach to see the same thing happening with handguns though. The short length and need for lighter weight would make such a gun harder and maybe not quite viable at the end of another 100 years.

That's if the 2nd Amendment makes it another 100 years

Sci-fi author here. I've got magazines feeding from portals. So even though the grip is the size of a standard pistol grip, it feeds from a portal that has a magazine located somewhere out in space and has 1000s of rounds.

In all seriousness...

Caseless ammunition (requiring electronic ignition and also requiring no ejection of spent casings) is a big plus.

Barrel and recoil spring swapping places, or revolvers with the barrel on the bottom chamber, to reduce muzzle flip. Same design as the Chiappa Rhino.

Handguns with adjustable grips already exist, handguns with adjustable weight plates is what I see next (change it from a 25-ounce carry gun to a 40-ounce recoil reducer).

Semi-autos with a red-dot sight that flips "closed" (flush with slide) when the safety is triggered and "open" (ready position) when the safety is flicked off.

Green lasers will be built into the guide rods and activate when contact is made with the 1911 style grip safety or glock style trigger safety.

Rail guns,lasers,needler pistols(uses a piece of polymer as ammo and throws flechettes),caseless weapons with no ejection port so they are a bear to keep clean.

People need to realize now, we are one Supreme Court Justice away from not being able to have guns in this country. That's a scary sobering fact. Who knows what the future holds.

Lets vote conservative every chance we can.

Caseless ammo? It's been around since the 1860's at least. Never worked well, still doesn't. Lasers? They've been around for generations but are clearly the wrong tool for this job. Electronic priming is interesting, but nothing more than a tweak of the existing ignition system. You have to think on a more fundamental level.

What will firearms look like in 100 years? I think the answer to this question will depend on the answer to one question and one question alone:

What will replace smokeless powder?

Ever since Paul Vieille finally unraveled the secret of turning nitrated cellulose into a stable propellant, we've been living in his world. With almost no exceptions, every single firearm is a smokeless arm designed around that chemical. It defines the parameters of what our firearms can and cannot do. It controls how they are engineered.

Only when we know what propellant replaces smokeless will we know what the firearms will look like. After all, a firearm is only device for containing and controlling chemical powder.

People need to realize now, we are one Supreme Court Justice away from not being able to have guns in this country. That's a scary sobering fact.

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It's not a fact at all. We're one justice away from going back to the way most judges interpreted the Second when I went to law school. Not something I want to see, but hardly "not being able to have guns in the country."

Gentleman, the point of the thread is to speculate on which current production firearms will still be in production 100 years from now, not about death rays and railguns.

A reasonable scenario might be extrapolated from black powder firearms today. Domestic military revolvers are still very popular, so that bodes well for the 1911 and Beretta 92 series.

Whether they're in production depends a lot on what they're competing with, though. And I can't see a 92 being reproduced for sentimental value a century from now.

I will bet flintlocks are still being made!

No real way to predict this. Look at the broomhandle Mausers. Its a gun that pretty much failed but there it is today a real collector's item and last I heard it was being reproduced. 2/3 of all cops today are carrying Glocks and for all we know the 90s may become some romantic period based on cop fiction similar to cowboy shooting today. I do think ARs and AKs are going to be made 100 years from now. Its likely we will be using M16s for another 20 years and there is no shortage of battle rifles that are 50 to 100 years old around now; FALs, M1s, 03s, Mossins, M14s... If the military issued it people want to collect it.

JohnBiltz said:

If the military issued it people want to collect it.

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That's why I think eventually the M9 will be lumped in with 1911's, Glocks and SIG's.

There's about to be a whole generation of veterans who only know the M9, and no matter how much we dislike them, there's always something to be said about that which you grew up with.

Think about how hated the evil plastic rifles were when they first came out... several variations later they're a hot commodity and a symbol of our country.

I could see the same platforms but with a tiny gyroscope and computer to completely stabilize the gun.

20 years ago we were stabilizing Rifles and MG from choppers, boats and ground transport. Never caught on for small arms.No one could sell the Military on it. Now tanks, thats another story.

Look through the early history of the semi-auto pistol you will find recoil springs over barrels, around barrels, connected to rods attached to barrels, behind the bolt, under the bolt and in the grip. Half slides,full slides, inturnal bolts, drop block, toggle lock, turn lock, cam lock. The ammo reload systems have been single shells into an interal mag,exturnal stripperclip loaded, internal stripperclip ejected when empty, bottom and top ejecting magazine,side loaded through a gate or apature, and last but not least semi-auto revolvers. The end of the 1800s and beginning of the 1900s was rife with the most variety of semi auto pistol variations. I've been forunate or cursed with the disasembly of quite a few of these in the process of cleaning and getting them ready to liquidate for my father.

I know I have probably forgotten something.

As to the future I think all of the classic autos and revolvers will be manufactured is one form or another. The way they are made might be radically different (3D copy macine). All projectiles will be lead free with polymer cases,caseless, and a few traditional. Propelents will include more efficient powder, gas,liquid and magnetic induction. We might have a smart bullit. OOPS, we already have most of these things now.

Never give guy too much coffee, Cheers, ts

Just as internal combustion engines, as we know them, will disappear. So will powder explosives in little cartridges. I dunno... maybe electric rail guns? Lasers?

Semi-autos with a red-dot sight that flips "closed" (flush with slide) when the safety is triggered and "open" (ready position) when the safety is flicked off.

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This sounds .... amazing! I want it so bad. But I agree on the sights idea, in a way.

I think the notion of hurling projectiles to wreck stuff is pretty much what we humans will always consider a "weapon" of sorts, kinda as a base notion, so I think the idea is going to be to make this more and more easy to do well.

Sights, converting pistols to SBRs and eliminating noisy powder seems like the next logical step. While lasers seem like a nifty idea and all, I don't think the idea will catch on (Oh god, won't I look stupid, possibly) simply because I can not imagine a lens being nearly as intimidating as a bore. Also a cauterized cut essentially seems nowhere near as intimidating as a splatter effect.
And while we keep saying that intimidation doesn't matter, I think the very base premise between human conflict arises over competition, and competition is way more economical when you can just intimidate, at heart.

My vote goes for sights development first, then packing the same weapon into several varieties and then developing a cheaper rock to fling.

Generation 18 of the Glock with some people still complaining about the grip angle and hand fit. Kimber the Solo is now bug free.