Most are gas operated. The firing pin strikes the primer, causing a jet of flame to ignite powder inside the cartridge case. This produces rapidly expanding gasses that drive the bullet down the barrel. Part way down the barrel, a small hole permits some of the gasses to push a piston. That piston pushes the bolt back, extracting the fire cartridge. At the end of the movement of the bolt, springs push the bolt forward, picking up and chambering a new cartridge- and is ready to shoot again.
Bolt handle was provided as a back up in case the semi auto mechanism did not function. Which it frequently did not.
You take it to a trained gunsmith for evaluation and repair.
Your rifle may be a Winchester Model 490. If so, it should have a button type safety on the side of the trigger guard to the front of the guard. This pushes through from right to left to release the safety. Please contact Winchester through their website for an owner's manual for your rifle.
It'll work just fine.
Automatic firearms work with a kind of "manual conveyor belt" mechanism. Tapping the trigger will fire a single round, akin to semi-auto fire. Holding the trigger activates a small set of gears that turn at a remarkable rate, ejecting an empty shell and replacing it with a fresh round at a continuous rate. Semi-auto doesn't have that same mechanism, or it is rendered inactive in semi-auto fire mode. The rate of fire is determined by how quickly multiple rounds are shot, or how quickly the gears turn. Examples of auto fire weapons are the SAW and M4A1, the latter having a semi-auto fire option.
Semi auto air guns are driven by C02 gas. when the trigger is pulled some of the C02 not only fires the projectile but drives gears that get the next pellet or bb in line to fire the next projectile.
If the round won't fit into the handgun, then it's probably not chambered for long rifle rounds.
A semi automatic would allow you to shift manually when up shifting for performance. A lot of cars appear to let you do that but, a semi automatic will shift into that gear instantly. Not when it wants to.
Gas from burning gun powder is used to extact, eject and load the next round into the chamber.
The best guns in RDR regardless of SP or MP are:Evans and Henry Repeating Rifles (use the Henry when you need more power, the Evans when you need a lot of bullets on target).Springfield and Explosive Rifle for long range targets.High Power and Mauser PistolsSemi-Auto and Blunderbuss ShotgunsDynamite, Holy Water, Fire Bottles, and bait (Undead and Boom bait) work well to deal with Zombies.
Remove the magazine, work to action, if that doesnt work, get a little metal stick or somthing and get the casing or bullet out of there. load up the mag, rack a round and keep goin
generally speaking, any .25 ACP ammo will work, assuming it's a .25 semi-auto pistol.