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Thread: learning about musket locks

  1. #1
    Boolit Bub
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    Mar 2016
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    learning about musket locks

    I know a little. I mean I have mainspring vises and can at least dismount them. It seems in the old days a gunsmith should have been able to make a lock from scratch. The whole kit and caboodle. I have a small box of orig. locks in various states of repair, all mixed up. How does one know how to make a tumbler work or when it is so far off to just give it up? Are there books, videos or classes on the subject? Jaeger

  2. #2
    Boolit Master
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    Quote Originally Posted by jaegerstutzen View Post
    I know a little. I mean I have mainspring vises and can at least dismount them. It seems in the old days a gunsmith should have been able to make a lock from scratch. The whole kit and caboodle. I have a small box of orig. locks in various states of repair, all mixed up. How does one know how to make a tumbler work or when it is so far off to just give it up? Are there books, videos or classes on the subject? Jaeger
    You can learn a lot if you just sit down quietly with those old locks and slowly work the action of them - watch the way the internals move - how the parts work together

  3. #3
    Boolit Grand Master bedbugbilly's Avatar
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    indian joe has excellent advice.

    Yes - some obviously made the complete lock but you'll find the many of the guns were made with locks commercially produced - either in England, Europe or in this country. Some gunsmiths made the entire rifle/long gun and others may have made their own barrels and furniture but utilize commercial locks - and don't forget that parts were "re-cycled" as well. I haven many examples through the years where barrels and locks were re-used a number of times - evidenced by barrel mounting lugs on the underside or lock bolt holes being filled and repositioned when used on a different rifle.

    As far as tumblers - I have owned originals where the tumbler had only one step - full cock - no safety half-cock. I have seen this in some larger musket locks as well.

    Take some of your locks and do as indian joe suggests and play with the tumbler and sear (assuming they are present) and take a look at the position of the hammer in the half-cock and full-cock positions. Half-cock position - whether a pattens breech or a drum and nipple should allow room to place the cap on the nipple (if percussion lock) or position the cock of the flintlock so the flint clears the frizzed in the half-cock position and allows for easy tip back of the frizzen to prime and close the frizzed when done. Full cock, of course, the tumbler notch should not be positioned so that the hammer interferes with the lock panel in any way when fully cocked.

    If the mainspring does not utilize a stirrup, then it has to be so that when the lock is un-cocked, the tip will not slide off of the tumbler but yet, when fully cocked, the tip of the tumbler does not press up into the top of the mainspring arched end. All of what I'm saying is pretty "basic" as far as explanation but by playing with locks, you'll soon see what is required of the various parts.

    "Lock geometry" comes into play - especially when it is a flintlock so that the hammer and frizzed locations work properly and that the sparks fall where they should. On a percussion gun, the geometry of the lock must be such so that the hammer cup hits squarely on the nipple for proper cap ignition and so that the nipple is not "peened" out of shape over time.

    You are doing things right by using a mainspring vise as on both smaller locks and larger musket size locks, it compresses the mainspring properly so that it can be easily removed and reinstalled. I have seen guys try to use shortcuts like a set of vise grips or channel locks and it's to hare to snap a mainspring into to useless pieces by doing that.

    Then you also have the locks with a fly detent that is required on a tumbler for use with set triggers. If you have one of those, play with it and study how the fly works when the hammer is cocked in relation to the sear.

    I'm not sure just what is out there, publication wise, as far as books about working on locks, etc. You might give the NMLRA a call or maybe someone here will be able to give some. If you have some old locks and parts and pieces, give it a try to see if you can fix one or two up. Trackd of the Wolf's catalogs used to show parts "full size" so you could kind of compare what you needed as far as parts to what they had to see if you could fit them to your original locks. The problem is that there were so many makers of locks and no set "standard" when it came to parts with the exception of locks like military locks once interchangeable parts were incorporated in arsenal built musket.

    Enjoy and have fun as locks are interesting. And if you ever get the chance - take a look at a "side slapper" or "mule ear" percussion lock - L & R makes one and I believe it is shown in TOW's catalog - a whole different design of a percussion lock.

  4. #4
    Boolit Master
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    The only way I've been able to learn is by looking at all the different locks on my BP guns. My first try was with a lock from a Tower Pistol kit made back in the 60's. It came from one of the low buck kits from Japan and had a soft frizzen, bad geometry and broke the main spring during assembly. I modified a spring from a Brown Bess which worked and after having it sit on the shelf for about eight years I have just turned it into a cap lock for a pistol build. Guess my advice is to find a beat up cheap lock or fire arm and try to tune it, if you mess it up well no big loss then move up, maybe purchase a set of casting and spend the time machining it into a functional lock.
    I've also made and installed a fly in cap lock action that came on a Monarch Hawken that the previous owner had dropped in a double set trigger. Nothing was right on the action and it was a real learning experience and worth the fifty bucks I spent on the rifle.

  5. #5
    Boolit Bub
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    There is at least one book about flintlocks. It's out of print now and not sure how easy they are to come by. Journal of Historical Armsmaking Technology is the name of it. I think the NMLRA was the one that put the books out. I have one I picked up from Gary Brumfield before he passed.

  6. #6
    Boolit Grand Master


    GregLaROCHE's Avatar
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    The most complicated part is the relationship between the sear and tumbler. I’ve ruined parts, by filling too much in the wrong spot trying to get a nice crisp trigger, with a sear that doesn’t catch in the half cock position when fired. It’s mostly about geometry between the two. Not easy for beginners. I finally got it figured out (I think), but it was a long and time consuming learning experience.

    The rest of the mechanism is pretty straight forward. However, if the sear and tumbler are working well, don’t change anything unless you have a lot of time and patience to spare.

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check