The flintlock is a made in India. Identify malfunctions and their elimination

[dd832]

I doubt this guy is going to listen to reason. The continual update photos is proof of that.

All I can say is; I hope this guy has the common sense to not attempt to fire this gun. He may get one or two shots before it lets go in a place he wasn't expecting, and blows half his face off, or worse injures some innocent bystander.

Some people though just wont listen to reason. I think the OP is such an individual. Sadly the only way these types will learn, is the hard way.

Sadly Sidney, if you actually read the original post you would have realized that the OP had only bought a lock from a company in India, not a firearm. But sadly, you have to pontificate that he might "blow half his face off" & "is only the type that will learn the hard way" - WHEN SADLY, HE ONLY BOUGHT A LOCK FROM INDIA.

But, "Some people though just wont listen to reason" and sadly, others cannot bother to read or understand the original post.

Andrey22 is an accomplished machinist, he has recreated several historic locks from scratch on this forum previously and he is demonstrating how he is improving a low quality lock - sadly, you (& others) have missed that important point.

Have a great day, Mike

 

[dave_person]

Hi,
The India-made lock may be the only choice with respect to style that Andrey can find or has available that is correct for his project. A Pedersoli version similar to it is quite expensive if even available and the other option, TRS, might just not be available either. Folks wondered why I spent so much effort working over the USA-made piece of junk lock in the following thread:
Reworking an L&R Queen Anne lock FINISHED

I did it because lefties don't have many other choices and I turned a lousy lock into a really fine one. I suspect Andrey will do the same.

dave

 

[Eric Krewson]

As a bow maker I have repaired bows for folk that took me so much time I could have made a completely new bow in the same amount of time. It wasn't about the time invested but whether I could pull lit off or not, some of us like a challenge, I understand.

 

[Sidney Smith]

Sadly Sidney, if you actually read the original post you would have realized that the OP had only bought a lock from a company in India, not a firearm. But sadly, you have to pontificate that he might "blow half his face off" & "is only the type that will learn the hard way" - WHEN SADLY, HE ONLY BOUGHT A LOCK FROM INDIA.

But, "Some people though just wont listen to reason" and sadly, others cannot bother to read or understand the original post.

Andrey22 is an accomplished machinist, he has recreated several historic locks from scratch on this forum previously and he is demonstrating how he is improving a low quality lock - sadly, you (& others) have missed that important point.

Have a great day, Mike

So I might have missed his point, oh well!. You will see he made no attempt to enlighten any of us as to the true situation, to which I'm sure he got a nice chuckle. I honestly don't care that I may have missed the point. And pontificate I will on yet another thread same as everyone else.

 

[Andrey22]

Thanks everyone.
Don't consider me impolite. In fact, there are many reasons and the main ones have already been named here.
Special thanks to dave_person, dd832 and Eric Krewson.

 

[Andrey22]

Large gap between frizzen and pan.

 

[Andrey22]

Improved slightly.

 

[mooman76]

Sometime repairing something/fixing that is poorly done so that is is worthy can give you almost if not more pride that building it from scratch. You get that feeling of doing something others can't do or may say can't be done.

 

[Zonie]

IMO, being able to repair things like this lock is part of being a good gunsmith so, this thread can be very useful to anyone who comes across the problems the India made lock has and wants to repair it.

Some of the problems this India made lock has have been seen on locks from even the high class companies so, let's forget about the lock being made in India and learn how to fix the problems shown here.

 

[Sam squanch]

I think there is a test you can do on a grinding wheel , by reading the pattern and color of sparks that come off the steel. Such as cast iron making few dull red sparks, and high carbon making a lot of bright sparks. I reworked one Indian made flintlock. It worked, but still had a 10 pound trigger pull . Never again.

 

[dave_person]

Hi,
Most India-made and many commercial American-made locks are best considered "kits" that can be turned into good locks if you know what you are doing. If you don't, they will never be any good.

dave

 

[Loren Rytter]

I am very glad to see some support and understanding of the goals and efforts of the OP. I was disappointed in the evidence we have lost the American characteristic of being resourceful.

Some, not all, of the locks used on the firearms we are interested in were produced by people living in areas with very limited resources. And the best knowledge of the time was rudimentary compared to the information so readily available at this time. Do you have a clear solution to producing a threaded hole and a screw that fits this hole when all you have available is an anvil, hammer, charcoal you made yourself and horseshoes? If the reenactment scrutiny applied the fabric- thread count, twist rate and uniformity, DNA analysis of the breed of sheep the fiber is from- were applied the locks used on current reproductions, they would all be rejected for material content.

Also, I appreciate the situation of the worker in India. He may be as intelligent as anyone on this forum, but if he is a teenager from a lower caste with no education, he is doing the best he can with the training, material and tooling he has available. This may be very comparable to the backwoodsman of early America who produced a firearm needed to feed and defend his family.

I have known a number of "center of the universe" personalities, but the internet sure allows them to be exposed to a lot more people.

 

[nagantino]

Improved slightly.

Clean, precise photography there man.

 

[toot]

thank you for letting me know how to make a frizzen fit to the pan, a great remidy.

 

[Andrey22]

I made a second hole and cut a thread for the screw that attaches the lock to the stock.
Made two screws for fastening the lock

 

[JCKelly]

I am one of the Illiterates who mis-read your post & thought you had an entire gun. Whoops. Sorry.
Now, as to that frizzen. Originals were forged of wrought iron. The frizzen face was a piece of actual high-carbon steel attached in some manner. Brazing common for commercial guns, forge welding for the better English guns or military. If you wish to avoid the interesting things that may happen as you learn how to heat treat by eye with a torch, you might want to start with pre-heat treated high carbon steel. And, Lo & Behold such exists in your own shop and/or the local hardware. That is, circular wood saw blades. Or ruin an old hand saw. The stuff is typically about 0.7% carbon, hardened somewhere in the Rockwell C 40's, about right for making a good spark from a flint. I might sggest soft solder, one of the lower melting grathe lowes

 

[JCKelly]

So here is one list of my sources, from my own collection:
Frizzen Steels 12/6/15

Flintlock frizzens were of wrought iron, with the striking face made of steel. The steel face could be applied in two ways. One was to forge weld a piece of steel to the wrought iron frizzen forging. The other, to braze a piece of steel to the frizzen face. Worn frizzens are said to have been repaired by brazing on a new face.

Examining a few guns, my conclusion is that muskets, both English and American, had no braze line showing. I.e., the frizzens were "steeled" by forge welding a steel face to the wrought iron frizzen forging. That welded piece would then be finish filed, the screw hole drilled, and finally heat treated.

American rifles have the steel, maybe 1/32" thick, brazed to the frizzen.

English pistols - only one shows a braze line. That is a so-called English trade pistol, made with a brass barrel, Birmingham proofs, and single-bridle lock labeled RYAN & WATSON. On this pistol the steel was clearly brazed to the frizzen.

I have only American flint pistol and that a ca. 1760 colonial pistol with English iron parts. It has no braze line visible.

Pistols

American

1. American military, no braze line visible

2. Colonial, American wood & mountings, English lock & barrel. No braze line.

English

1. Wogdon great coat pistols .45 cal, pair. No braze line

2. Early Sea Service pistol, .75 cal. Frizzen worn, no braze line.

3. Light Dragoon, WILLIAMS marked lockplate, .64 cal. No braze line

4. Sea Service, .65 cal, dated 1808. No braze line

5. Richards, iron barrel No braze line

6. I Richards, brass barrel. No braze line.

7. Queen Anne, Blyth. No braze line.

8. Turn-off barrel cal pocket pistol BUNNEY. No braze line

9. RYAN & WATSON brass barrel trade pistol, steel brazed on.

All these English pistols, save one, have frizzens that appear to be welded.

The exception, which does have a braze line, is a so-called English trade pistol, made with a brass barrel, Birmingham proofs, and single-bridle lock labled RYAN & WATSON.

Long guns with welded frizzen faces. All original fint.

1. India pattern Brown Bess, ca. 1810.

2. Paget carbine

3. Irish blunderbuss, single bridle lock marked THOMAS

4. Harpers Ferry 1808 musket dated 181

5. Massachusetts 1808 pattern musket, marked 181

American rifles, all with brazed faces, all locks are original flint
(Brazed frizzen steels tend to be a thin, maybe 1/32" thick, piece of steel.)

1. The one whose frizzen is shown below is listed as Rifle #3, pages 83-84, in
"The Kentucky Rifle", by Capt. John G.W. Dillin, 1924.

BTW, if you do not have Dillin I urge you to get thee a copy and read it.
I read my Dad's in 1951.
It was written a century closer to when muzzle loaders were in daily use.

Modern books on the subject are nice, but they are all, well, -- modern.

"Steel" in the old terminology meant a piece of fairly pure elemental iron which contained anywhere from 1/2% to maybe 1-1/2% carbon. It is the carbon that meant the stuff would get hard when heated red hot then cooled quickly, as by quenching in water.

I am a metallurgist by schooling and quite a few decades.

 

[Andrey22]

I found a photo of a Russian flintlock infantry rifle model 1828. From the photo I made a side plate template.
Initially, I roughly cut the contour and processed it on the grinder.

 

[Andrey22]

Then he processed the plate with different files and finally grinded.

 

[dd832]

Andrey, I've posted 2 scans of a French Model 1774 musket. I'm not sure if they will of any use to you because your lock looks to be about 150mm long and the Model 1774 is 159mm long, but you can make adjustments by scaling down.



This is the source of the plans:


keep up the good work, Mike