History:
After World War 1 in Austria around 1918 Franz Pfannl produced a small self loading pistol and put in on the market under the name "Erika".
It had the uncommon caliber 4,25 mm, where Pfannl also designed and produced the matching cartridge.
Besides the strange small caliber 4.25 mm, it was of extraordinary shape, the magazine was placed in front of the grip and the complete pistol was extremely narrow.
The standard model was blued, but there were nickle plated models available too, as well as cases with velvet.
During the time of production some changes were done on the design. First types were long ones with cross checkered riflings at the slide, later model had straight riflings. Then a model with shorter grip and shorter barrel followed.
Due to the ineffective caliber, the "Erika" pistol has not been a big success and was not distributed over a large area.
It stayed in production and /or sale until the beginning of the 1930ties, but the total number produced is estimated not to exceed 3500.
Therefore the pistol as well as the cartridge is already very scarce today.
The cartridge was adopted by the company Menz in Suhl/Deutschland for their "Liliput" pistol. Pfannl did deliver bigger amount of his ammunition to Menz, so therefore the cartridge today is rather known as "4.25mm Liliput" than by it's genuine name "4.25mm Erika".
Technical Data:
SYSTEM: self-cocking pistol with internal hammer
CARTRIDGES : 5 + 1
CALIBER : 4.25 mm Erika (Liliput)
BARREL LENGTH : 55.9 mm, 6 grooves right hand twisting
WEIGHT EMPTY : 250 g
TOTAL LENGTH : 135 mm
TOTAL HEIGHT : 95 mm
TOTAL WIDTH : 18 mm
TRIGGER : Single Action
SIGHT : fix
SAFETY : lever
FINISH : blued
GRIPS : hard rubber