Help with nagging question?

[Tiger]

From the same site, seems like handcrank to me. Also the hole-pattern in the barrel doesn't look the same to me.

[Tiger]

Ok, have been searching around a bit.

First of all I think we all agree Ramon's gun is an automatic one. There's no crank visible in the movie, we don't see Ramon cranking. There's clearly two handles on the backside which would be stupid if you had to put one hand on a crank somewhere anyway. So, automatic ...

All machine gun sites I've come accross agree on one thing. The first automatic machine gun was produced by Maxim and demonstrated in 1885. They also say it was purchased by the British Army in 1889 and first used in 1893, but then again you never know who was at the demo and learned a thing or two there  .

So if Leone was true to history it gives us a minimum timing for FOD. However I've not seen a single picture resembling the Ramon gun, so I stick with Harmonica's first opinion, it's just a cool looking prop.

[Man with no dame]

There's no crank visible in the movie,....... it's just a cool looking prop.

  There is a visible crank, which kind of proves it was a hybrid prop. A pepper-box style machine gun like this, would have spent it's ordinance in very quick fashion, and ripped horse and soldier to shreds. There was no one in the wagon to re-load, and I doubt any remaining soldiers would have waited for Ramon to do it. Most definitely a prop.

[cigar joe]

As in AFOD &  Django the cartridge belt never moves.