Frizzen Tempering

[doug]

    I just finished replacing the frizzen on what I think is an L&R lock and all that I am getting is a very few large orange sparks.  I hardened the frizzen to medium to dark brown which is still quite hard but I am wondering if I should have only drawn the temper to a golden colour to get better sparking

    Any thoughts out there from those who do lots of frizzens ?

thanks Doug

[rich pierce]

Was it glass hard after hardening (can't scratch it with a new needle file)?  I find that initial hardness is usually the problem.  I don't take them past golden color (light straw) on the upright striking face but temper the toe to purple.

[doug]

    It seemed to be file hard after the initial hardening.  I heated to red hot then quenched into water with 1/4" of oil on top to guard against stress cracks.  I drew to medium to dark brown and a bit hotter at the corner because I am always afraid of the frizzen snapping at the corner.

     The strange thing is that the frizzen that I replaced did not seem to be high carbon but was hard.  It was deeply cratered to form two or three ridges and I ground the face smooth and tried it.  The sparks while grinding were all deep orange with no bursting white carbon sparks like I would expect on a high carbon steel.  After grinding, it sparked with large orange sparks but not an awful lot of them.  I also resharpened/knapped the flint just to be sure the problem was dull flint.  I will try rehardening and drawing to golden and see how that works.  Sort of had the impression in the past that a frizzen face could be too hard.

     I did get one strange effect; every few strikes a spark would stick to the cutting edge of the flint and fizz for a second or two; something I have never noticed before on any flintlock soft or hard.

cheers Doug

[rich pierce]

I find heating colors for hardening to be very different to my eye than to others.  "Cherry red" has never worked for me and I don't know what kind of cherries those guys have seen.  I go to what looks like "orange" to my eyes.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Doug, don't throw that old frizzen away.  I regrind a frizzen at least three timesw before it needs replacing.  That's around 10000 shots + or - 2 shots. 

When I install a new one, having first fitted it, (isn't that a mouthful) I heat it to orange or glowing red and quench it in motor oil at shop temperature.  I re-polish it so I can see the coloours, and heat the pan cover and toe until blue runs up the frizzen face about 3/16".  I quench it again just to stop the heat from running further up the face.  Now I place it in the kitchen oven at 400 degrees F. for one hour.  It will be a uniform straw colour except for the blue area and the darkened toe. 

I noticed that it takes a couple of strikes to cut through a skin of non-sparking steel, and the sparking just gets better and better, until it knocks chops out of the flint, when it needs resurfacing on the grinder.  I do this by holding the frizzen face against a 6" wheel on a bench grinder with my thumb against the back of the frizzen face.  If it's too hot for my thumb, it's too hot for the steel too, and I quench in water and grind again.  I remove all of the dished area, and do not re-heat treat again.  It will spark like a cutting torch from now until it no longer can be ground.

Jerry Huddleston (God bless him for his benevolence) case hardens the surface of the face while it is bright glowing red, and proceeds as I have described.  This adds even more carbon right where it's needed, and the frizzen definitely will spark better than without the case hardening process.

Let us know how you make out.

[doug]

      Definitely no tossing out the old frizzen; didn't need replacing just grinding from what I can see.  I did put a heat sink on the pivot area and reheated the striking face to red hot and quenched again then drew to straw and seem to get much better sparks so I think I will stop there.

      I have got nervous about how hard to make a frizzen after trying to repair one on a Charleyville pistol replica.   Extremely strong mainspring and the owner claimed it would spark with a piece of wooden.  Eventually the corner broke between the pan cover and the face so in a flash of brilliance (I thought :>)  ) I welded the two back together, heated red hot and annealed then reheated and tempered only to have the face break just above the weld.  That frizzen was made from a truck coil spring but the main problem is that the cock hits the frizzen hard enough to put about 3 or 4 times the stress on it as a normal rifle lock

cheers Doug

[Long John]

Thamk you, Taylor.  I just copied aand saved your post to my file on frizzn hardening for future reference.

Best Regards,

JMC

[angus]

Doug, don't throw that old frizzen away.  I regrind a frizzen at least three timesw before it needs replacing.  That's around 10000 shots + or - 2 shots. 

When I install a new one, having first fitted it, (isn't that a mouthful) I heat it to orange or glowing red and quench it in motor oil at shop temperature.  I re-polish it so I can see the coloours...

 I do this by holding the frizzen face against a 6" wheel on a bench grinder with my thumb against the back of the frizzen face.  If it's too hot for my thumb, it's too hot for the steel too, and I quench in water and grind again. 

Just my 2 cents worth. Taylor makes some very crucial point in these comments. The re-polish to see the colors is an absolute tell tale method and show much more vivid if the surface is bright.
As a toolmaker, I always make sure to have a large amount of quenching media on hand. You do not want the oil to get hot, as its job is to quench(cool) the part. In other words, use a vat larger than a soup can to quench with. If the oil bubbles, you don't have enough. And when you quench the part, make certain to keep the part moving in the oil until it is fully cooled to the point you can handle it in your bare hand. Yes, it is messy. To keep the part moving in oil, tie a wire around it before heating. Some smaller wire can actually get so hot it will break so I usually double wrap it and this gives me a nice handle to swirl the piece with and don't have to fish for retrieval.
And anytime you are grinding on a hardened surface, doesn't matter if it is a frizzen, a drill bit or a lawn mower blade, if you can't hold you hand on it directly next to the surface you are grinding or if you see the metal change color, you have changed the tempering properties of the metal.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Thanks John.  Jerry's notes on hardening and tempering the frizzen are somewhere in ALR's memory banks, and are much more complete and informative than my short comment. 

[ironwolf]

  I do mine very similar to Taylors method.  Except I draw mine down to 400 deg. before I flame the toe and pivot hole.  One can also submerge the frizzen face in a bucket of water with the foot sticking out and blue it that way. The colour can't run up the face.

  Kevin