Thoughts on traditions rocklocks

What are the experiences with traditions flinters? With no caps to be had looking to go to a flinter. Not a newby have owned several and built one. Not wanting to spend a grand on a hunter

I have a Traditions flintlock. It’s my 1st “rocklock”,so I don’t have anything to compare it to. I followed advice I read on this forum, and polished all mating surfaces on back of lock. Using 2000 grit paper, I polished plate, spring, tumbler, etc. to a near-mirror finish. I also lightened frizzen spring. There’s still a very slight delay between pan & main charge ignitions, but it’s faster & more reliable than it was when I 1st got it. I’m happy w/it, and it’s very accurate.

Mine had a wave washer in the frizzen pivot. I replaced it with a flat washer as a spacer, greatly reducing the friction. I also smoothed and polished the casting seam where the frizzen contacts the spring, and slightly reshaped the profile so it snaps open on its own once the flint travels far enough.

I have only had a failure to fire if I have a dull flint or dirty frizzen.

I've had good experiences with the Traditions flinters.

Barrels are astonishingly accurate for the price. Biggest weakness is the lock itself and the patent breech can be annoying to clean. Sending my lock off to @FlinterNick to be looked over was a worthwhile investment for reliability.

Nothing wrong with them at all. They might be improved by some simple polishing and tuning.

Go ahead and get it! One neat thing is later on down the line, if you want to various companies make drop-in American made locks that you can swap out the original for. Same for triggers. As someone else mentioned the Traditions barrels are exceptionally accurate and they can shoot VERY well. My Traditions Crockett is a lights-out squirrel buster!

Love my Kentucky rifle and pistol "rock locks". As others have said a little polishing and lube slicks them right up. I mainly use 5/8"x3/4" black English flints from TOW and the only failure to fire is when a haven't picked the touch hole after a few shots.

I have two Traditions flinters. One is about 35 years old and the other is about 15 years old. I haven't touched either lock. As long as I pick the touch hole before every shot, they fire fast and true. I also have a custom made flinter with large Siler lock. Not much difference as far as I'm concerned.

Bearkiller said:

I have two Traditions flinters. One is about 35 years old and the other is about 15 years old. I haven't touched either lock. As long as I pick the touch hole before every shot, they fire fast and true. I also have a custom made flinter with large Siler lock. Not much difference as far as I'm concerned.

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Many thanks!

"rock lock"

RobertIN said:

Barrels are astonishingly accurate for the price. Biggest weakness is the lock itself and the patent breech can be annoying to clean. Sending my lock off to @FlinterNick to be looked over was a worthwhile investment for reliability.

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Depending upon the model, caliber, etc, that patent breech can be modified to relieve the difficulties many experience with that design on a flinter. My .36 caliber Shenandoah was rebored to .46 to use revolver ball and at the same time the barrel smith fixed the breech.

nkbj said:

Depending upon the model, caliber, etc, that patent breech can be modified to relieve the difficulties many experience with that design on a flinter. My .36 caliber Shenandoah was rebored to .46 to use revolver ball and at the same time the barrel smith fixed the breech.

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I wouldn't mind having mine drilled out just to make cleaning a little less of a hassle. Do you have any recommendations?

They are about the least expensive flintlock you can buy.
A cheap flintlock isn't worth the trouble.
Good locks cost good money.

the lock is the weak point but Brad at cabin creek muzzleloaders here in pa fixes them to work right sight in target 100 yrds

They actually work better when you call them flintlocks.

mhuffman217 said:

What are the experiences with traditions flinters? With no caps to be had looking to go to a flinter. Not a newby have owned several and built one. Not wanting to spend a grand on a hunter

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I have one Traditions flinter. It's their Pennsylvania Longrifle before they shortened the barrel and overall length. The barrel on my is 40¼" in length. It's a straight tapered octagon, highly decorated, and has that Roman Nose of a stock. Traditions also puts very small locks on their longrifles. They are the size of a pistol lock. Once you figure them out they are dependable shooters and accuracy is excellent with them. Mine likes a 95-grain charge of FFFg, which is a heavy charge. My other longrifle with its 44½" swamped barrel likes an 80-grain charge of FFFg. Part of the fun with these things is figuring out what your rifle actually likes for best accuracy as it can vary from rifle to rifle.

The drawback I had/have with mine is that big ol' Roman Nose of a stock. It's a straight stock with no offset, as most off the shelf guns and rifles are. So when I sight it, mounting it like I would any rifle, I have to lean my head over a bit to get the alignment. When I fire it that darn stock slams into my cheek with the recoil which gives me a nice bruise. I found two ways to avoid that - one is to mount it with my head farther back on the stock where it is low enough that I can sight it without leaning my head over it. The other is an old shotgunner's trick where I will turn my nose in towards the stock and sight my target out of the corner of my eye. Then I can sight my target without leaning my head over, and the recoil just slides the stock along my cheek instead of slamming into it. Turning your nose in to the stock moves your eye closer to the sights the distance between your cheek and your nose. I like that because I also shoot shotguns sometimes.

That small lock that Traditions uses on their longrifles is "persnickety" too. A lot of it has to do with where the touchhole (the vent) is located. Ideally you want it aligned in the middle of the pan with the top of the pan intersecting the middle of the middle or bottom of the vent. Try to stay away from one that has the vent aligned with the bottom of the pan or bumped up against the front or rear of the pan. If you can inspect them, those are things you want to look for and choose a different one.

When it comes to shooting them, you need to make sure your flint is striking the frizzen a glancing blow that will scrape sparks off the face as opposed to a smashing blow which will maybe spark once crushing that nice edge you had on the flint and dull it so you can't get another spark out of it. It's a Goldilocks effect. Too small of an angle (like 45°)and you'll crush the tip and possibly break the flint. Too shallow of an angle (75° or 80°and you'll launch a piece off of the underside of the flint, typically leaving just two contact points for the flint and a weak spark. But if you get that angle right, you can get 100+ shots off of the same flint without the need to touch up the edge. It's literally self-knapping when you get it right. Usually if you can get your flint to strike the face of the frizzen at a 55° to 60° angle, that will do it.



To check to see at what angle it's hitting, close the fizzen and slowly lower the cock until the flint touches the frizzen. At that point imagine a straight line up at 90° from that contact point. The face of the frizzen is curved, which is why you need to imagine that straight 90° line to get it. You may have to move that small flint (5/8" flint) forward or backward to get it. If you have to move it up a lot, put a twig behind the leather flint pad to keep it from moving back. If it needs to go back farther remove the flint and the leather that holds it out of the jaws: fold the leather in half at the middle; and cut a V notch in it. That will give you a diamond shaped hole in the middle of your flint leather and will allow you to scoot it a little farther back until the jaw screw of the cock is up against your flint and not stopped by the leather.

One final thing I'll mention that really did the trick for me with this small lock was how to put the right amount of powder in it to get instantaneous ignition instead of the Hollywood movie "sh-sh-sh-sh-BANG". That's known as the fuse effect and comes from overfilling the lock. I have a much larger lock on my other longrifle from a private builder and it doesn't care how little or much is in there, it always goes off. However, with my Traditions longrifle, I found that filling the pan half full; closing the frizzen; and then giving my wrist a quick snap in a clockwise direction made it a reliable shooter - no more flashes in the pan, fuse effects, of failure to ignite. That was suggested to me by a member here on the forum back in 2004 and unfortunately I've forgotten who suggested it.

That half full pan with a wrist snap clockwise moves the powder to the outside half of the pan so there is an empty space between the vent and the powder. With that space there, it never has to burn through more powder to get to the vent and the flash goes in unimpeded and instantaneously. For my Traditions Pennsylvania Rifle, that fixed it. And don't worry about not having enough powder in the pan. It actually takes very little powder to make it go boom.

Here's another thing I was told to try - open the frizzen; lick your finger and moisten the pan with it - no puddles, just moistened. Then fill the pan with powder and dump it back out. Just the little bit that adhered to that moisture will be enough to set it off. In fact that fellow said to go ahead and turn it upside down with frizzen closed and fire the rifle - and darned if it didn't go right off even when upside down.
So if you have trouble getting a Traditions longrifle to go off instaneously when you pull the trigger, try the "fill half full and snap your wrist to the right" to see if that doesn't cure it. It did for me.

Hope that helps!

Some of the comments above suggest boring out the barrel, getting additional small brushes, etc. I would suggest the OP take a look at an earlier post of mine when a fellow was inquiring about a patent breech and read my answer to it. You'll find it at the link below:

https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/...-the-bottom-of-the-barrel.183410/post-2668246

I have used that method of cleaning my muzzleloaders for the last 20-years, even with my standard breech rifle, but it was a cure-all for keeping that patent breech clean and operational.

Dan

olskool said:

"rock lock"

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Current “hip” term for the snarky cool. I think it’s ghey.

sturmkatze said:

Current “hip” term for the snarky cool. I think it’s ghey.

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when i hear that i get ill,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

I bought a Traditions flintlock kit for my grandson one year. He showed interest in wanting to try muzzleloaders but I didn't want to spend a lot of money in case he wound up not liking it. Turns out he did. We found the gun to be an OK shooter but it's dinky little lock leave a lot to be desired. It requires those small 5/8 flints and even then there isn't much room for the frizzen to operate. His always would never allow the frizzen to close fully on the pan so he'd always have to ensure the gun was held upright or his pan powder would vacate the building.