New Wheellock from Bolek

[LT Joe]

Here are a few photos of a new wheellock I just to from Bolek in Poland. It is a very early outside spring model that Bolek calls a "Tschinke" type.

 

[Flint62Smoothie]

Are you kidding me? That is unreal!

 

[PathfinderNC]

Amazing!

 

[rickystl]

WOW!!! That lock is a beauty !!! It's now just begging to have a gun built for it. LOL

I believe the Tschinke style was re-introduced in the mid-18th century for sporting use with nobles in the Bavarian countries. A fad at the time.

Wonderful lock. Congratulations.

Rick

 

[LT Joe]

Here are a few photos of a new wheellock I just to from Bolek in Poland. It is a very early outside spring model that Bolek calls a "Tschinke" type.View attachment 249254View attachment 249255

This is my first Tschinke type wheellock and I was surprised to learn that it's operation is very different from the typical wheellock. I thought it was just a regular type wheellock that happened to have the mainspring and chain mounted on the outside. That is not the case. There is no depression or hole on the backside of the wheel which allows the wheel to "lock" into place when it is wound enough for the spring loaded "detent" or pin on the back of the lock to drop into the hole. If you just wind this mechanism the wheel will never lock into place because of this.

Instead , what you do is wind the wheel a full turn with the spanner, which will fully compress the mainspring, and then, while holding the spanner in place, you push in on the strange screw slot-headed bolt you can see sticking out at the rear of the lock and this pushes a bar on the backside which fits into a notch on the sear. This then holds the wheel in place ready for firing. As soon as you pull the trigger this moves the sear which releases that bar holding the compressed mainspring and the wheel then spins.

A very different type of wheellock mechanism and I am told it is somewhat rare.