My first Lehigh. Gotta have a patchbox.
Basic patchbox laid over stock for best position. At this point, the box needs to be curved to fit the contours of the stock. The hinge itself is curved. Thank goodness the lid has one knuckle. More than that, and the hinge may not swivel. The box is screwed down to the stock and stabbed around the finial only. The finial is inlet fully, as well as the hinge. But not the door. yet.
Once the finial is fixed, the door is laid down, and inlet up near the hinge. As I can lay more and more down, I mark the door, and inlet it. Once it's inlet, I can mark out for the cavity. Drill the holes deep enough for a Snickers bar.
Square up the drilled holes. Clean out the cavity walls and bottom.
The inlet for the spring must be made. This spring is a bugger. Just wait and see. Note that the spring inlet is off to the top edge of the box, where there is a rabbet for it, curving out of the cavity as you get closer to the end of the cavity near the buttplate.
Bend a piece of wire to see if you can worm it in thru the spring passage to the far end of the rabbet. This is a trick I made up just now for this problem of fitting a spring to a pre-existing inlet.
Make the spring to replicate the wire in size, but add a bit of length to the spring to plunge into the far end of the cavity.
Make a tool to burn a recess for the end of the spring to be buried in. You need a recess of some kind for the end of the spring. Burn it, or drill it, or gnaw it, you need a retainer pocket for the spring. You cannot drive this kind of spring into hard maple without dire consequences to the spring or chipping out the maple.
After many expletives and 'ah-ha' moments, I managed to get the spring into place without busting out the thin little wooden bridge over the spring entry hole. Note there is no button on the end of the spring. This is commonly known as cheating. I plan to braze the button on afterwards.
Here is a trick that I developed just today, but probably Jacob Kuntz had already thought of this and whispered into my subconscious what a fool I am for thinking that I thought this up myself.
Make yourself a little sheet metal 'catch' to see what you need for the iron one you will be putting on the door.
When you have your little sheet metal catch so it works, use it as a pattern for the real deal. Scribe it along the buttplate edge when in position in the gun. Thank you, Jacob.
Catch installed in door. Rectangular shank on the catch piece that gets riveted onto the door. It will never spin.
In the closed position. Not the easiest patchbox release, but a fun challenge.
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