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Flintlock question

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Renegade Dan

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I have to polish my frizzen around every 100 shots or so and I also have to resharpen my flints between 10 & 15 shots. is this the norm? does it mean my frizzen is too soft? A friend told me the frizzen spring seems to be real stiff on my pedersoli flintlock could this be the cause of my problems? I'm pretty new at this flintlock shooting so please bare with my ignorance.
 
I would say that your results aren't the same as mine- I haven't had to polish a frizzen in quite some time, and I usually get many more than you 10 to 15 shots between sharpening flints.

The stiff spring might be the cause of some of your problems. Conventional wisdom holds that the spring should only be strong enough to hold the frizzen closed, and that anything more than three to five pounds is probably excessive. (I will be the first to admit that I don't have a trigger gauge and I haven't measured my spring tensions.)

Before you try to lighten the spring, make sure that the pivot of the frizzen is smooth (a bit of wet/dry sandpaper will fix this, I go to a 400 grit but that's probably guilding the lilly) Polish the bolt which provides the pivot for the frizzen lightly (you don't want to remove material- just knock off any burrs or nasties on the shaft of the bolt) and be sure to polish the little piece of the frizzen which slides on the spring itself. Then be sure to put a few drops of lube on this contraption to keep everything working smoothly.

Hope this helps!

now i'm curious .... let us know how things turn out.
 
Pedersoli thinks that the spring tension on the frizzen MUST BE hard(HEAVY?) in order to get the flint to cut steel. They also tend to sell frizzens of softer steels.

The only job a frizzen spring has is to keep the frizzen closed when the muzzle is pointed to the ground( down)! :doh: :idunno:

Since the typical frizzen's WEIGHT can be measured in OUNCES, the tension on the frizzen's cam from the frizzen spring needs to be only a POUND, or a bit more if you are shooting the large musket locks( with heavier frizzens). 2 lbs. of tension is more than enough.

Good sparking is a function of three things:

1. A good flint;
2. The correct angle and height of the flint so that it strikes at a 60-66 degree angle to the face of the frizzen; and
3. Strikes the face 2/3 of the distance UP from the bottom of the face, ( Heel) when the frizzen is closed.

You want the flint to cut and scrape steel off the frizzen in the "MIDDLE" third of the face, and the frizzen should pop open early enough to allow the sparks to be THROWN down- not dribbled down-- into the pan.

Until you tune this lock properly, you will have to polish the face often to keep from having gouges form where the flint strikes the face.

REDUCING SPRING TENSION: You can reduce spring tension by polishing FIRST both the cam and the contact point on the top arm of the frizzen spring to mirror finishes, and then oil those spots. Also, you need to clean, and oil the pivot screw/pin for the frizzen EVERY TIME you take the gun out to shoot. Work the frizzen back and forth several times to make sure it pivots freely.

You need to clean off the oil/grease used to reduce friction for the frizzen after each use, as part of your regular cleaning regime. The grease or oil unfortunately catches and holds fine BP soot particles which add resistance. Clean it off, and then re-grease, or re-oil the parts before the next shooting event. Since these two areas need to be polished, I oil them after each cleaning to keep the bare metal from rusting during storage- even over night.

CORRECTING SPRING TENSION: On really poor locks, I have used fine INDIA stones to reduce the height of the cam. The goal is to see NO movement of the top arm of the frizzen spring as you slowly open the frizzen. Movement indicates that the flint has to push forward on the frizzen to get the darn thing to open.

LESSONS LEARNED: One of the interesting lessons and observations I made long before I owned a flint lock happened at the Fall National Matches at NMLRA range at Friendship, Ind. I saw some men shooting large barreled flintlock rifles off custom benchrests, and was surprised to see that some of the guns were flint locks. Looking closer, I noticed that a couple of the locks did not have any frizzen spring on them!

Being a young kid(THIS TOOK PLACE IN THE 60'S), I asked the owners the dumb question when he finished his shot and brought the gun back t the loading bench. "Why no frizzen spring?"

He told me that his gun was made for bench rest shooting, and the rate of twist was designed for the ball/bullet( I have forgotten which he was shooting) he was firing. The gun was far too heavy to use hunting, much less lift to shoot off-hand in the other rifle matches.

So, since range rules did not allow the guns to be primed until the gun was safely pointed down range( ie. resting on the custom made bench) AND the range officer had opened the line to shoot, He simply had no need for a device to keep the frizzen closed. Once sitting at the bench, with the gun mounted on its bags, he simply primed the pan, and closed the frizzen. The highly tuned lock sparked like the 4th of July, and the gun fired very fast.

ERGO, it was not necessary to have lots of spring tension on the frizzen to get good sparks.

After his next shot, another dumb question occurred to me: " Aren't you afraid that the frizzen might flop back and break your flint after the gun fires?"

He smiled, and showed me a soot covered piece of Leather washer( a disk with a hole through the center for the pivot screw) between the inside edge of the frizzen, and his barrel. He told me that leather washer is soft enough to stop the frizzen from flopping backwards, but not hard enough to add resistance to the frizzen to slow its opening. He then let me move the frizzen back and forth to FEEL how easy it moved. He oiled that leather disc before each trip to the range, also.

He then told me he originally put the disk in between the barrel and the inside edge of the frizzen to stop sideplay, or "wiggle", of the frizzen on the pin. The fact that it prevented the frizzen from flopping back was an "UNEXPECTED, Secondary Benefit". HE TOLD ME HE REALLY DIDN'T WORRY ABOUT BOUNCE BACK, OR "REBOUND" OF THE FRIZZEN, AS IT DIDN'T WEIGHT ENOUGH TO DAMAGE HIS FLINT.

LIFETIME LESSONS LEARNED: It was at that point that I realized that I had been allowed entry into the strange world of Flintlocks- if for only a few moments-- and that I had been given very valuable information. It was almost 20 years later that I got my first MLer, and then converted a rifle from percussion t flint lock, when I began learning some of the finer points about tuning these locks for maximum performance( Speed of ignition, reliable ignition, long flint life, and less damage to the face of the frizzen).

KNAPPING FLINTS:The flint you use will determine how often you have to knapp the edge, even in a well-tuned lock. That is the nature of rocks. However, I expect, and get 80-100 strikes from my flints, although they have to be knapped every 20 shots or so, and usually moved forward in the jaws at least that often. After about 50-60 strikes I sometimes have to reverse the flint in the jaws, and knapp a new edge to continue getting good sparks from the same flint.

CHANGING FLINTS: When the flint gets so short that I cannot hold it firmly in the jaws of the cock and have the edge close enough to the face, when the cock is in the half-cock position, then I change flints. I also always put a new flint in the gun before going hunting.

DEALING WITH SOFT FRIZZENS: You have two choices when dealing with soft frizzens that just don't spark well: you can have the frizzen "CASE HARDENED"( or do it yourself); or you can replace the frizzen with a better one.

Case hardening involves using a product "Kasenite" to add carbon to the steel by coating the face under high heat( Mapp gas, or acetylene), then dropping the frizzen quickly into water to harden it.

If you don't know what you are doing, give this kind of work to an experience Black powder gunsmith.

Replacing the frizzen may be easier. Call lock makers, like L&R, to ask if they make a frizzen that fits your Pedersoli lock. Many of the suppliers of parts for Mlers will also know where you can buy a replacement frizzen. Don't hesitate to call Track of the Wolf, MidSouth, and Dixie Gun Works to ask. The Log Cabin Shop, and Chuck Dixon( Dixon's Gunmakers Fair) are also expert sources of information.

Best wishes to you. :hatsoff:
 
MSW gave some good advice, but it might be easier to simply remove the frizzen spring (just for a test) and see if that helps. As has already been stated, the ONLY purpose of the frizzen spring is to hold the frizzen closed. Another term for the spring was feather spring. The lock will spark just fine without it.
My personal feeling, is that there is about a 98% chance that the spring is the problem. Almost, if not all, production locks use cast springs. This means that there is zero flex in the bend of the spring. It is, for all practical purposes, a leaf spring instead of a V spring. You will only need to thin the part of the spring that holds the frizzen shut. As I write this, I have the frizzen spring from my TVM southern rifle lying on the desk next to me. If I pick it up and try to flex it at the top of the “V”, I can’t. As far as I’m concerned, it is WAY too stiff. I’ll be heading out to the shop later and introduce it to Mr. Dremmel.
Incidentally, I have only had one range session, consisting of about fifteen shots, with the southern gun. There was one klatch, but all the other shots went off like a good flintlock should so it was sparking okay. With the spring removed you can just about take flash pictures with it. With a lighter frizzen spring it should do that most of the time.
 
DEALING WITH SOFT FRIZZENS: You have two choices when dealing with soft frizzens that just don't spark well: you can have the frizzen "CASE HARDENED"( or do it yourself); or you can replace the frizzen with a better one.

Case hardening involves using a product "Kasenite" to add carbon to the steel by coating the face under high heat( Mapp gas, or acetylene), then dropping the frizzen quickly into water to harden it.

If you don't know what you are doing, give this kind of work to an experience Black powder gunsmith.

Replacing the frizzen may be easier. Call lock makers, like L&R, to ask if they make a frizzen that fits your Pedersoli lock. Many of the suppliers of parts for Mlers will also know where you can buy a replacement frizzen. Don't hesitate to call Track of the Wolf, MidSouth, and Dixie Gun Works to ask. The Log Cabin Shop, and Chuck Dixon( Dixon's Gunmakers Fair) are also expert sources of information.

There is a third method that falls between casehardening and replacement, and it was a common practice when flintlocks were in common usage.
The frizzen can be half-soled. A hardened piece of steel is either soldered or riveted to the frizzen. I did this with a sawed-off 1795 musket that had been converted back to flint using a industrial hacksaw blade for the half-sole. It went from unreliable to downright scary in the spark department.
And then of course there were the radio active half-soles that Russ Hamm sold for a while. Those sparks went all the way to the ground and danced around fizzing.
 
My pedroseli ate flints like crasy until I "lightened " the frizen spring. Now it works great! :idunno:
 
Had the same problem with a fixer-upper I bought a while back ($75 for a gun that went off 1 out of 10 times...and ate flints like crazy) can't pass up a bargain so among the other "issues" the great bargain allowed me to work on, I polished the top of the spring and the heel of the frizzen that touches the spring very smooth, keep that area clean and oiled and it shoots 10/10 now...
 
Renegade Dan said:
I have to polish my frizzen around every 100 shots or so and I also have to resharpen my flints between 10 & 15 shots. is this the norm? does it mean my frizzen is too soft? A friend told me the frizzen spring seems to be real stiff on my pedersoli flintlock could this be the cause of my problems? I'm pretty new at this flintlock shooting so please bare with my ignorance.

You could be like me... I'm lucky if the flint LASTS 10-15 shots :cursing: . Dang T/C Hawken is shattering the Tom Fuller flints I have :hmm: ... and has done it since I purchased it on Gunbroker. Sent it back in to T/C and Ernie French worked on it and replaced the frizzen with a hardened one since my unit was an older one. I had told him about it eating flints like there was no tomorrow. He ships it back with a note that it appears to be working fine and it has one of their crappy sawn flints in it. Still has the old hammer. Took it out yesterday - guess what - yep, still eating the manure out of my flints. It's no fun to be shooting and have the flint shatter almost up to the clamp after a few shots. I guess I'll end up having to get an L&R lock :surrender: and if anyone asks me my opinion on the T/C Hawken, tell them to stay away from T/C because their customer support is sorely lacking at this time in my experience.
 
Let's think this over a bit. There are 1000's, probably hundreds of thousands of TC's out there and they pretty much shoot well. I can personaly attest to about a dozen flint models myself. Other forum members can add to the total.
So where is the problem? If it is something you are doing an L&R lock will NOT fix it! Actually an L&R lock is no better than a new model TC lock is. You may take that comment from experience. :hmm:
 
"and if anyone asks me my opinion on the T/C Hawken, tell them to stay away from T/C because their customer support is sorely lacking at this time in my experience."

Wow that sounds firm, almost like blasphemey around here, you might want to keep a close watch on your first born male child and be prepared with insecticide for the Locust that are sure to befall your dwelling :grin:
 
"Has sold more than 1,000,0000"

Which to me says they must make a pretty good product, have never owned one, and that in general their customer service must be pretty good. That said, they went over the gun in detail and seem to have failed to fix the "Shattering Flint" issue.

So as not to perpetuate Blasphemy, Heresy or anything of the like(have to admit that for a first post that was pretty strong):

First qiuestion - is there something that could be wrong with the lock htat would cause this, and perhaps was missed when it was in for repair?

Let us assume the lock is working as it should and that the hammer is striking square and the spring force is not so large that it is causing the flints to shatter. If that is true, what helpfull suggestions are there with regard to what the user may be doing that could cause the problem. First thought, flint perhaps set to close to the Frizzen, jaws not holding flint properly? Being such a green user mmyself I can't come up with the answers but I will bet there are those on here that can.
 
In my Traditions lock, sawn flints last for more shots than knapped flints. I like to knap my own flints so I usually use them, but the sawn flints do last noticeably longer. That could have more to do with my quality of knapping than the type of flint, I can't say. If you're not concerned about the HC aspect you might try using them, see if that makes a difference.
 
First lets assume your useing good flints,not cut from stone thats been laying on the surface exposed to frost. The most common fault is flint set at 90degre to frizzen face at point of impact the flint has to perform a slight scrapping action so set flint slightly nose down the flint is only a cutting tool its the heated steel it scrapes of that sparks you could infact use carbide but doesnot look so nice dont suppose the game would mind if your a hunter.
 
ebiggs said:
Let's think this over a bit. There are 1000's, probably hundreds of thousands of TC's out there and they pretty much shoot well. I can personaly attest to about a dozen flint models myself. Other forum members can add to the total.
So where is the problem? If it is something you are doing an L&R lock will NOT fix it! Actually an L&R lock is no better than a new model TC lock is. You may take that comment from experience. :hmm:

That's the whole point... the main problem is the old style hammer is beating the manure out of the flints(bevel up, bevel down and within the 1/16" to 1/8" gap between flint edge and frizzen). T/C was told that several times. The lock was sent back to them with paperwork showing that fact. The replace the frizzen ONLY and leave the same crappy hammer on it that they KNOW is designed improperly. They ship it it back... it continues to eat the flints (Tom Fuller English and French amber). I contacted them back and I even offered to PAY for the new style hammer and can't get a response from them. And there ARE a lot of people having the same problems, otherwise T/C would never have redesigned the hammer. I am reasonably sure that the new hammer and the changed angle of attack will solve the problem. The PROBLEM is getting the hammer from T/C. At least with the L&R lock, you can order most parts for it easily. You try and find a new style flintlock hammer lately? Good luck, I haven't been able to find one.
 
SOMETHING ELSE TO CONSIDER...,

Another problem with the frizzen tension is sometimes the frizzen cam, the part of the frizzen that somes into contact with the frizzen spring. I have seen spring surfaces that needed a good polish with emory cloth, and I have seen frizzen cams that were too long, so required much more pressure to depress the frizzen spring so that the frizzen would then pivot on the frizzen screw and move forward..., along with that the cam on the frizzen also needs polishing. Both frizzen cam and top surface of frizzen spring need to be very smooth, which thus reduces friction. So in many cases I have had to reduce or "round" the frizzen cam, polish it, and then polish the fizzen spring to correct the problem found in the original post. Just be careful when reducing the cam, as you can remove too much, and screw up the whole show.

LD
 
Loyalist Dave said:
SOMETHING ELSE TO CONSIDER...,

Another problem with the frizzen tension is sometimes the frizzen cam, the part of the frizzen that somes into contact with the frizzen spring. I have seen spring surfaces that needed a good polish with emory cloth, and I have seen frizzen cams that were too long, so required much more pressure to depress the frizzen spring so that the frizzen would then pivot on the frizzen screw and move forward..., along with that the cam on the frizzen also needs polishing. Both frizzen cam and top surface of frizzen spring need to be very smooth, which thus reduces friction. So in many cases I have had to reduce or "round" the frizzen cam, polish it, and then polish the fizzen spring to correct the problem found in the original post. Just be careful when reducing the cam, as you can remove too much, and screw up the whole show.

LD

Have already hit it with an Arkansas hard stone that I use to hone the bearing surfaces on triggers with. Did that right after it came in. One thing, I don't have a trigger pull gauge, and the spring seems to be really strong when opening the frizzen (the spring was the other thing replaced). I don't want to hit it any more heavily than I already have. I'm leaning towards the frizzen spring being a little to strong.
 
...tperry, I suggest you contact member named round ball... In my opinion, he knows t/c flinters better than t/c smithies... I would be shocked if he could not help resolve your difficulties...
 
bob4st said:
...tperry, I suggest you contact member named round ball... In my opinion, he knows t/c flinters better than t/c smithies... I would be shocked if he could not help resolve your difficulties...

If I can get ever get a newer style T/C hammer from them and that doesn't solve the problem I'll do that. I have a sneaking suspicion that the new hammer will solve it tho'. The recommended size (think it is 5/8" x 3/4") Tom Fuller English or French amber flints don't even fit on this lock. Bevel up and it raises the frizzen slightly. Bevel down and you are right on the frizzen. Tells me something is stinky with the hammer.
 
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