wheellock safety-how made?

[TNHillbilly]

I recently took up a rebuilding some of the parts on a Lauber design lock I had built. I'm getting good results using a piece of what I call 'sand dollar' pyrite. I've seen a number of pictures of locks with a 'safety' slide but can't figure out how to build one, or exactly how they work. Any ideas, pics, plans? Bill

 

[Alden]

In a wheelock? Hmmm... No. I have one in a flint blunderbuss lock but don't remember what it is actually doing.

 

[ChrisPer]

The safety on wheellock puffers pivots on the outside of the lockplate. It has a spike on the lever that goes into a loop made on the minor sear, which projects through a hole in the lockplate.

There is often an external decorative part over the hole to protect the delicate parts from being knocked. That part is not there in the Lauber design, because it was simplified out of most of the wheellock pistols of the 1630s-1640s.

 

[TNHillbilly]

Thanks for the explanation and drawings! Makes that more easily understood. It would be very difficult to add that feature to the Lauber lock after its construction, owing in part to its small size. :bow: Bill