You honestly find the weirdest things in charity shops. I picked this up about a week ago, for $20:

If this looks like a giant syringe…well…you’re not far wrong!

What we have here is an old-fashioned hand-pump fire-extinguisher, from the era around 1910-1930. It’s a Pyrene-style solid brass automotive fire extinguisher, of a kind that used to hold a fire retardant chemical called carbon tetrachlorine.

These small (14in. long, 3lb-weight, 1qt capacity), hand-pumped fire-extinguishers were very common from the 1910s up to the middle of the 20th century. Unpressurised and worked by hand, they were usually mounted in steel frames and stored on (or inside) early motor-cars, to be used in the event of a car-crash. They’re almost iconic with old cars – it’s like, you couldn’t have a car made before the Second World War, and not have one of these go with it!

They work very simply. You hold the barrel in one hand, turn the handle with the other (to the left), pull out the plunger, and, taking aim (and a firm grip!) you pump the handle back and forth. This builds up pressure inside the cylinder to force out the firefighting fluid through the nozzle at the front. It’s basically a giant, brass water-pistol or super-soaker, but it takes considerably more muscle to operate it!

One good thing about this extinguisher is that it is infinitely reusable. After emptying the 1qt (approx 1 litre) capacity in the cylinder, all you need to refill the extinguisher is a screwdriver (or a large coin) and a supply of water.

As these extinguishers were not pressurised (you have to pump them to do that, remember?), it’s actually really easy to open them and refill them, as there’s no chance of them exploding if you try to do so.

These extinguishers have a screw-down filler cap at the top of the cylinder, next to the pump-handle. A large coin or a suitably sized screwdriver is all you should need to unscrew the cap, and then refill the cylinder. These old pumpers work just as well with water, so provided everything else is hunky-dory, you can use these extinguishers almost limitlessly. Once they’re empty, simply unscrew the cap, lock down the handle, fill up the cylinder, screw the cap back on, and you’re ready to go!

It was a lot of fun cleaning, polishing and testing this extinguisher. The fact that it’s 90 years old and still works is pretty damn impressive in my book. It just goes to show the quality of workmanship back then.