R. E. Davis Jager Lock Problem

I have a R. E. Davis Jager lock on a rifle and am having all sorts of problems with it. With the bevel up and the flint adjusted any where near the frizzen at half cock, the flint will jam into the bottom of the pan when fired. With a flint in bevel up and adjusted back enough to prevent it from hitting the pan,it strikes the frizzen lower than half way down its face. With the bevel down it jams into the frizzen.I also think the frizzen is too soft as it is all scarred up. I'm thinking about ordering a replacement frizzen from TOW. Then heat treating the original one and at the same time tipping the top back towards the hammer to bring it closer to the flint and give the flint a longer scraping ride to the bottom. Dose any one know if a replacement frizzen would come properly heat treated? Has any one ever changed the attitude of a frizzen in the manor I have described?

 

[rich pierce]

A replacement frizzen will come soft, unhardened, and probably not drilled for the screw. It does sound soft.

This lock might take some tinkering. You should think about seeking a replacement from R.E. Davis.

If you decide to tinker with any lock, all warranties are off. You are on your own if you make it worse or no better.

Forget everything you ever heard about putting the flint close to the frizzen at half cock. That may work with a Siler but many other locks- no. It all depends on the position of the half cock notch. On some locks, this notch is at a different place on the "clock" than on others.

If you do decide to tinker, I'd advise not trying to bend a frizzen. This can cause all kinds of problems. I'd adjust the angle of the cock first. If you do that, insert a top jaw bolt when doing the bending or the threds may get distorted. It is also possible the top jaw may not fit as well after bending. If possible, bring the jaws of the cock up and back. This may help the flint strike higher on the fizzen. If the flint still bashes into the pan, then you need to fix the stop that is on the cock by riveting a piece of steel on that shoulder of the cock that stops against the upper edge of the lockplate bolster. The frizzen should be re-hardened and may require case-hardening. If you're not good at drilling, reaming, fitting, then you are better off with hardening your current frizzen after grinding out the bash marks.

 

Here's my R.E. Davis Jaeger lock with a 7/8" flint. Maybe you can compare yours with this photo and look for any drastic differences. The frizzen face on mine is pretty scratched up and gouged but she sparks without fail every time. My bevel is up and it strikes the frizzen face about halfway up. At half cock the end of my flint is about 5/16" away from the frizzen but I've knapped this flint a time or two(it has around 40 shots on it or so). In the fully rested position as in the photo the flint is about 5/16" above the bottom of the pan. It sounds as if your flint may be too long. I hope this helps.

 

[Zonie]

I've seen the same thing with the flint hitting the bottom of the pan if it is located close to the frizzen at half cock on both my Davis Jeager and Davis Type C Fusil lock.

Both locks flint strikes low on the frizzen and both frizzens show scratches and some gouging but nothing really bad.
Both locks send out a good shower of sparks and fire the guns very quickly.

I'm not going to mess with something that works, even if it is different than my Silar locks.

 

[Birddog6]

My first thought is you may have a 3/4" flint in a lock that requires a 7/8" flint...... Whatcha think ? :hmm:

 

[Stophel]

Among the many design and mechanical deficiencies of the Davis "Jaeger" lock, is the cock stopping too far down with the flint crashing into the pan (this isn't the only lock that suffers from this problem...). The frizzen doesn't need work, the cock does. It needs to be reshaped so that this doesn't happen.

Davis now makes a new cock for this lock that not only looks better, but it stops in a better position to help alleviate the flaws of the previous design.