Drum magazine

A drum magazine is a type of high-capacity magazine for firearms. Cylindrical in shape (similar to a drum), drum magazines store rounds in a spiral around the center of the magazine, facing the direction of the barrel. Drum magazines are contrasted with more common box-type magazines, which have a lower capacity and store rounds flat. The capacity of drum magazines varies, but is generally between 50 and 100 rounds. In 1853, the first revolving drum magazine was patented by Charles N. Tyler, and the first modern-type one by William H. Elliot, better known as the inventor of the Remington Double Derringer, in 1871. A drum magazine was built for the Luger (Pistole 1908) pistol; although the Luger usually used an 8-cartridge box magazine, the optional 32-cartridge Schneckenmagazine ("snail magazine") was also sometimes used. Moubray G. Farquhar and Arthur H. Hill applied for a British patent for "A New or Improved Cartridge Magazine for Small Arms and Machine Guns" in 1915 for their Farquhar–Hill rifle, and it was accepted in 1919. In 1915, the Standschütze Hellriegel M1915 (German: Maschinengewehr des Standschützen Hellriegel, "Machine gun from reservist Hellriegel"), an Austro-Hungarian water-cooled submachine gun, was produced during World War I in very limited prototype numbers. The Soviet PPD submachine gun originally designed in 1934 by Vasily Degtyaryov could use either a 35-round box magazine, or a 71-round drum magazine copied from the Finnish Suomi KP/-31 submachine gun that however used 9x19mm Parabellum instead, and the latter magazine was most common. The Soviet PPSh-41 submachine gun and PPS-43 which replaced the PPD were cheaper and more reliable weapons designed in 1941 and 1943, respectively. They too used 7.62×25mm Tokarev ammunition, could use either a 35-round box magazine or a 71-round drum magazine, and the latter was most common. The Thompson submachine gun ("Tommy gun") used a drum magazine in its classic form, but the drum magazines for this weapon were abandoned on the World War II models.