New Frizzen needed?

Newbie question here. I bought an old TC Hawken .45. The frizzen as I understand should be pretty hard to produce good sparks. This one seems to be soft. It has a lot of scars/scratching that is pretty deep from the flint digging into it. I would say they are pretty deep, about .015-.020 deep. Should I replace it or is this normal?

So, no spark?

Dave Marsh said:

So, no spark?

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It will spark, but it seems to me it really wears down the flint. Made the flint really jagged edge after 1 srike

Texian said:

Newbie question here. I bought an old TC Hawken .45. The frizzen as I understand should be pretty hard to produce good sparks. This one seems to be soft. It has a lot of scars/scratching that is pretty deep from the flint digging into it. I would say they are pretty deep, about .015-.020 deep. Should I replace it or is this normal

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Frizzens will vary with surface shown wear. If it sparks well, use it and don't look back. If it don't spark well replace or repair.
Larry

Texian said:

It will spark, but it seems to me it really wears down the flint. Made the flint really jagged edge after 1 srike

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Flints vary, some are harder than others. To me a good sparking frizzen is the priority. JMTC
Larry

Looks normal, if it sparks then investigate ways to make your flints last. How they are mounted and the shape makes a difference.

Looks like your frizzen is fine.

normal for a TC frizzen. those lateral troughs are what fractures your flint.
on half **** what is the distance between the flint and frizzen face. 1/16 of an inch is optimum in my experience with TC'S. the closer the flint is to the frizzen the higher on the face it strikes, causing the frizzen to start opening sooner.
Ox-yoke has replacement frizzens but i found they needed hardening, which is not too hard to do.
if you get stuck with that one not working, and can't find one let me know as i may have one in my whatzit drawer.

I have frizzens that make that one look new, adjust your flint angle and protrusion and you can change how and where it strikes the frizzen.

The earlier TC locks were harder on flints than the later ones. They changed the shape of the hammer and frizzen a bit to improve the geometry. You can do an image search and see which yours is. If it's the early, you may be able to get some newer parts to upgrade.

Texian said:

It will spark, but it seems to me it really wears down the flint. Made the flint really jagged edge after 1 srike

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Does the gun have an old or new style ****?

@Texian, before buying a new frizzen, you can try to adjust the angle the flint strikes the frizzen. The gouges you see are from the flint bashing the face of the frizzen. You want the flint to scrape the face of the frizzen. You can lift the back edge of the flint by placing a short strip of leather lacing or a short length of a bamboo skewer. That change of angle can change the lock from a basher to a scraper. Maybe a bit thicker strip of leather will be needed to improve the geometry of the flint to frizzen.

SDSmlf said:

Does the gun have an old or new style ****?

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I'm not sure, I don't know the difference. The barrel is old enough not to have the safety warnings, but the lock seems to be newer to me, as the only wear on the finish seems to be on the pan and the frizzen

deerstalkert said:

normal for a TC frizzen. those lateral troughs are what fractures your flint.
on half **** what is the distance between the flint and frizzen face. 1/16 of an inch is optimum in my experience with TC'S. the closer the flint is to the frizzen the higher on the face it strikes, causing the frizzen to start opening sooner.
Ox-yoke has replacement frizzens but i found they needed hardening, which is not too hard to do.
if you get stuck with that one not working, and can't find one let me know as i may have one in my whatzit drawer.

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The distance is much further. From some of the things I've read on hear it seems to me to be striking a little low on the frozen.

Texian said:

I'm not sure, I don't know the difference. The barrel is old enough not to have the safety warnings, but the lock seems to be newer to me, as the only wear on the finish seems to be on the pan and the frizzen

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The older style cocks strike lower on the frizzen and not at an optimal angle. For comparison, here is a photograph of a newer style **** (first photograph) compared to yours (second photograph), an older style example.

Texian said:

It will spark, but it seems to me it really wears down the flint. Made the flint really jagged edge after 1 srike

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Also looks like you may be using a sawcut flint. Personally, never had much success with them.

Whatever that white thing is in the **** jaws, get rid of it. It's dull beyond use and had a terrible angle to begin with. Get yourself some real gunflints which are chipped by hand from blades struck from chunks of real flint. You'll likely have to continue the "bevel down" orientation of the current "flint" because the **** is too short and if you install it the other way, the flint's edge will only contact the lower third of the frizzen face. Still not ideal even bevel-down because the angle that the flint hits the frizzen will be close to 90 degrees which kills the edge on the flint and gouges frizzens. You want the top edge of the flint to be about 45 degrees to the frizzen face when contact is made, it's a balance between the flint trying to dig in too much and too little. The fire is made by scraping off little curls of white-hot steel from the frizzen face, so wear and scrape marks are normal, but you shouldn't be developing bad horizontal grooves in the face and should be getting 30-50 shots at least from a good flint before touching it up, then another 20 or so. With a much higher quality lock that has proper geometry and spring balance, over 100 good strikes can be reasonably expected per flint.

The first thing I would do is replace the flint with a better one. The one in the picture is worn down and the sawn flints don't take to knapping to sharpen them. I have had good luck with English flints from Dixie Gun Works.

Thank you gentlemen for all the advice. I'll start with a new flint.

Texian said:

Newbie question here. I bought an old TC Hawken .45. The frizzen as I understand should be pretty hard to produce good sparks. This one seems to be soft. It has a lot of scars/scratching that is pretty deep from the flint digging into it. I would say they are pretty deep, about .015-.020 deep. Should I replace it or is this normal?View attachment 362724View attachment 362726

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Why do you think you need a new frizzen? Because of the scratches on the frizzen?

This is normal, it’s a flintlock, the flint cuts small slices of steel off of the face of the frizzen.

All perfectly normal.

That frizzen will out live you you and your grandchildren.

It is not a big deal to re-harden a frizzen.