Lock installition

[little joe]

Is there any historical documentaion on how the old masters installed a lock into a gunstock, dissassembled or assembled?

[ken]

I really have no ideal how a assemble lock could be inlettied into a stock. All photos of the old timers  show the  lock plate going in first. I usually  do most of my tuning during this prart. 

[mjm46@bellsouth.net]

Don't know how it was done then. I'm not THAT old. But I say dis-assembled. Why make a hard enough project harder than it needs to be?

[Acer Saccharum]

I think a lot of builders inlet all in one piece.  Not me, tho.

T

[Mark Elliott]

I was shammed into inletting the lock in one piece by Wallace Gusler after he ridiculed my inletting method.    That is how he does it.  He was right.  It is easier and the inlet is better.   Mark Silver also inlets in one piece.  I don't know who else does.   As I was taught,   I completely finish the lock (file, polish, engrave, tune) and then inlet it in its finished condition.   I suspect that the guys that did this for a living, did it in this manner.   The inlets on the original longrifles were generally not as pretty as a lot of you guys try to make them.    I try to work in the manner of the original gun makers.   That means,  I don't try to do better work than the best of them; and with regard to inlets, that means neat and clean, but not looking like the wood was molded around the lock.      I do generally try to inlet the barrel a bit better than most of the originals in that most of the originals are content with a round bottom barrel channel.    I at least square up the channel even if it doesn't fit all that tight in the middle.

[Habu]

The inletting on my first rifle was rather indifferent: not bad, but definitely not flawless.  I've practiced a lot over the years, and by now I can do a fairly good job of it.  But. . . all attempts to inlet an assembled lock have been utter failures, worse than my first attempt way-back-when.   

How in blazes do you do it, Mark?

[Sawatis]

So Mark
I too inlet the lock in one piece ...also drawing from Wallace and Mark Silver ( his old video shows the process pretty good but not in its entirety). Thing I run into is after in letting, using the lamp black and all, I end up taking it all apart anyway to clean it up!  Do you do this as well, or did you find an end-around?
John

[Acer Saccharum]

I cannot conceive how I'd get the touch hole lined up properly if the lock was complete. At the very least, I'd be sorely tempted to take the sear off.


It might be one of those things that just works??


Hey, I have a build I'm doing for someone else. I'll try it out on HIS gun, not mine. 

[Mark Elliott]

You don't need to have the lock positioned perfectly until you start to inlet the plate.   The way you start this is that you position the lock as best you can over the stock and then hit the lock plate with a mallet over the sear leaving an indentation of the sear bar.   I then drill a 3/8" hole a little more than half way through the stock with the indentation of the sear bar at the bottom of the hole.  Next, you are going to hit the main spring.  Again, positioning the lock as best you can in final position,  take a pencil and out line the bottom and front of the main spring.  Now, you can inlet for the mainspring to final depth using a depth gauge.  I use David Crisali's depth gauge for this type of work.   But as to depth on the main spring,  keep cutting down until you hit the barrel and/or ramrod channel at the front.   Remember to leave a little piece of wood between the mainspring and the bolster.   You will want to inlet the bolster as you get the main spring inlet.   This is pretty easy.  You can just cut out most of the wood by eye with a saw and chisel.  The final fitting can be done when you get it down to that  As to the internals.   just hog out 2/3 of the wood under them and then worry about fitting with marking compound.   I use magic marker.   It wipes off with alcohol when done.     Once you have done all of this,  then your lock plate should be sitting on the wood.   Now,  it is just a matter of doing the final positioning and marking the plate inlet with a sharp pencil or marking knife.

[Acer Saccharum]

Thanks, that makes sense. You aren't locked in from the first cut, you've got wiggle room as you inlet deeper.

[little joe]

Mark  How long does it take to install a lock in the manner you spoke of?

[Artificer]

Mark,

Do you or have you ever thought about using oversize length lock retaining Bolts/screws to pull the plate in for the final inletting?

Gus

[Acer Saccharum]

Mark,

Do you or have you ever thought about using oversize length lock retaining Bolts/screws to pull the plate in for the final inletting?

Gus

Gus, I see where you're coming from. This would only work if your bolts go in straight.


I like to have the bolt heads low as I can get them on the sideplate panels, so this usually means the bolts enter the lock plate at an angle. The front bolt and rear bolt often aren't at the same angle, which would complicate things.

[Mark Elliott]

The amount of wiggle room and the time it takes to inlet depends on how much of a "poured in" fit you want for the internals.     Looking at my time sheets it looks like a lock inlet takes me between 4 and 8 hours.    In other words.  a normal day of work in the shop. 

[Gaeckle]

Mark  How long does it take to install a lock in the manner you spoke of?

......10 minutes with a really big hammer?

[Artificer]

Mark,

Do you or have you ever thought about using oversize length lock retaining Bolts/screws to pull the plate in for the final inletting?

Gus

Gus, I see where you're coming from. This would only work if your bolts go in straight.


I like to have the bolt heads low as I can get them on the sideplate panels, so this usually means the bolts enter the lock plate at an angle. The front bolt and rear bolt often aren't at the same angle, which would complicate things.

Acer, Thank You,

Yes, I can see what you mean after thinking about some original rifles and pistols I've been in where they had to do "adjustments" due to the fact the hole for the front lockplate bolt was not bored through the stock quite in the right place to clear between the bottom of the barrel and the top of the ramrod hole.  Some of these "adjustments" included:

A.  Though the bolt heads of both lockplate bolts were of a size as close as possible when making them by hand, the diameter of the shank of the front screw was reduced to better fit between the barrel and ramrod hole.

B.  In some original flint and percussion guns, I've seen a "U" shape filed into the bottom of the barrel for room for the forward lockplate bolt or the "U" shape filed on bottom of the front lockplate bolt to clear the ramrod.

C.  On a very small percentage of original guns I've seen, it was not possible to easily remove the front lockplate bolt after it was unscrewed from the lockplate.  I think I've seen this on maybe two original flint pistols and one later flint rifle. 

The first time this happened to me was on a flint pistol and I wound up dismounting the barrel and THEN the front lockplate bolt came out easily.  On close examination, the body of that front bolt was "upset" or forged thinner in the center of the shank, though the shank diameter near the head and near the lockplate were larger.  IOW, the middle of the shank was tapered down from both ends of the bolt to clear the barrel and ramrod hole.  The front lockplate bolt could be unscrewed far enough to take the lock off to clean and lubricate it, but would not come out of the stock until the barrel was removed.  It finally dawned on me this was how the original Gunsmith got around the "OOPS" of the romrod hole being drilled to close to the bottom of the barrel.  That was not a low quality pistol, so I smiled and had a new appreciation that even some of the better original gunsmiths occasionally had an "OOPS" that they had to use their ingenuity to fix.

Gus

[little joe]

The amount of wiggle room and the time it takes to inlet depends on how much of a "poured in" fit you want for the internals.     Looking at my time sheets it looks like a lock inlet takes me between 4 and 8 hours.    In other words.  a normal day of work in the shop. 

I don,t  feel too bad as it takes me about 4 hrs to do one a peice at a time.

[Swampwalker]

Since it takes maybe a minute to disassemble a lock, and there's no 'wiggling' involved, and I can inlet one piecemeal in 4 to 8 hours, why would I want to do it without disassembly (provided Wallace isn't looking over my shoulder)? I don't buy the argument that the oldtimer did the lock inlet as a single unit.

[Dennis Glazener]

Since it takes maybe a minute to disassemble a lock, and there's no 'wiggling' involved, and I can inlet one piecemeal in 4 to 8 hours, why would I want to do it without disassembly (provided Wallace isn't looking over my shoulder)? I don't buy the argument that the oldtimer did the lock inlet as a single unit.

I have only done a couple without disassemble but it did seem easier to inlet for the internal parts. Seemed like I did a better job of inletting only where necessary versus hogging out more wood to avoid binding. It did make aligning the lock properly a bit scary but both of them turned out fine. I am not sure it saved me anytime but I suspect that after I did a few it would be faster. I am slow either way.
Dennis
 

[KLMoors]

I guess I do it as a combination of these two methods. I inlet the plate and then re-assemble the lock- everything except the sear. I lay it down and sight down along the edges to get it close to where it will sit, draw lines around the parts, hog out for the parts using a depth gauge, and then inlet it with magic marker.  I still end up taking out quite a bit of wood.

The reason I do it this way is that I tend to obsess about the exact location of the lock. I clamp it to the gun after I inlet the bolster and then move the ends up and down microscopic amounts until it looks good. I think it is just me, but a tiny amount of "out of alignment" really drive my eye crazy.

My first couple of guns, I cut a fancy mortise and ended up with some binding as the seasons changed here in NC.   Now I leave more slack.

[Acer Saccharum]

I take all the stuff off the plate anyway for fitting and tuning. While it's apart, I inlet the plate. I'm not trying to defend or promote one way or another, but I have the heebie-jeebies about inletting a lock all in one piece.

[Don Stith]

Don't know what is HC but the way I do it is a lot faster and less nerve wracking.
 I inlet the plate. Then use a scribe to mark the various screw holes. Next step is to use a drill press with a stop and drill to  depth at location of the screws. These are premeasured for depth from inside of plate before disassembly
 I then use the screws inserted through bridle etc to orient the part and draw around it.  Reset the depth to the thickness of the part and drill a few more holes inside your scribed lines.  Chisel out the shape of the part to the depth established with the drill.
 The location of the sear bar can be established the same way, as can the mainspring based on the pivot pin. . I have slowed down a lot from age but can stil get one in near perfect in two hours.  Used to routinely do it in one hour.
 I don't consider a drill press to be enough advanced over a post drill  to think I am cheating.

[Acer Saccharum]

Don, I've used some of your method here: http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=23601.0

But it takes me a couple of days. 

[Don Getz]

Acer........I don't think I could drink that much coffee.......2 DAYS, wow.   I want to know how you inlet a certain part, let's
start with the bridle(?).   What type of chisel do you stab into the outline?  How do you get the bottom of the inlet to be fairly
smooth?   In all of the guns I have made, I can't remember one that had an outstanding lock inlet............Don

[Acer Saccharum]

You really don't need to have an outstanding inlet for a lock. I just can't help myself sometimes. The maple can handle the detail, and I like the challenge. But I'm not making a living at this.