Verney-Carron
Company type | Firearms |
---|---|
Website | www.verney-carron.com |
Verney-Carron
Although more well known in France than the rest of
History
The company was founded in 1820 by gunmaker Claude Verney (1800-1870), who came from a family of prominent gunsmiths since 1650, and at the age of 20 won first prize in an armory competition (French: Concours d'Armurerie) held by the City of Saint-Etienne. He later in 1830 married Antoinette Carron, the daughter of another gunsmith family, and changed the name of his business to Verney-Carron. When Claude Verney died in 1870, his eldest son Jean (1839-1916) took over the business with his brothers, and the company was named Verney-Carron Frères (brothers) before restored to the old name by Jean's son Claude (1868-1941) in 1917 after Jean's death.[1]
At the end of the
At the end of World War II, the company rebuilt by assembling six manufacturers, under the name Groupement d'Exploitation des Fabricants d'Armes Réunis (GEFAR). Despite competition from the national arsenals, over 150,000 firearms were manufactured, most of them under the
In 1963, Verney-Carron absorbed SIFARM, a combination of the venerable manufacturers Berthon Frères, Francisque Darne, Didier-Drevet, Gerest and Ronchard-Cizeron, along with the famous barrel maker Jean Breuil. The Sagittaire, the first
In 1985, an over & under Sagittaire with a light alloy receiver was introduced, and was an immediate success that ensured the Sagittaire's retaining its No. 1 market position. Three years later in 1988, the new Super 9 was introduced in the "Trap" model, and was followed by many others, notably the "Plume" ("featherweight") model in 1993. The Super 9 gradually replaced the older Sagittaire line, but one model, the "Double Express", was introduced in 1989, which, added to the "Impact" rifle, improved the sales of rifled firearms. A new Sagittaire model called the "Nouvelle Technologie" was introduced in 1994, and was lauded by the whole hunting press and enthusiastically taken up by hunters.
In 1990, the marketing of a brand new defensive weapon called the "
Products
Rifles
Break action
- Sagittaire and SagittaireXS series
Manual repeating
- Impact Plus series — bolt action (discontinued)
- Impact LA series — pump action
- SpeedLine — lever-release rotating bolt short-stroke gas piston
Semi-automatic
- Impact NT series
Air rifle
- VC'R
Shotguns
Break action
- SOLO — single-barrel
- Vercar
- Sagittaire series
- Super 9 series
Manual repeating
- P12 — rifled pump action
- Véloce — lever-release blowback
Semi-automatic
- Impact series
- Matrix series
- V12N