how to build a lock ?

[frenchman]

Is there a book out there showing how locks are made or what steel to use and who to go about it , I am very curious, went with the search engine did not find much.
Denis

[brokenflint]

There is some information in the "Journal of Historical Armsmaking Technology Vol 1"  put out by the NMLRA, (Gary Brumfield wrote the article, he's flintriflesmith here on ALR).  This is lock construction from the historical point of view tho.  Jim Chambers has a pretty good set of instructions on assembling his lock kit.

Broke

[Stophel]

Are you wanting to build one totally from scratch?

I'll get around to that myself...eventually.

Mild steel (properly casehardened) would be fine for virtually everything.  Frizzens would be best 1095, and springs would be 1095 or 1070 or something like that.   

[winemaker]

The book on how to build a double flintlock shotgun has a very good chapter on building locks from scratch.

[Eric Kettenburg]

You can use just about any kind of iron or steel you want for banging out a plate, cock, pan etc.  Just caseharden it.  I have a huge load of 108x that I use for springs and frizzens and which works perfectly with a lukewarm water quench (no crappy baked oil cleanup!)  The real key is getting as close as you can with the forging so you don't have to spend a month filing!  The JHAT book with the lock forging article is excellent.

[dogcreek]

If you can get hold of a copy of Gunsmithing Tips & Projects there is a useful article by John Bivins called, "Precision Assembly of Lock Kits."

[Canyonrun]

LOCK PATTERNS by Pryor Mt Bill Newton show over dozen different lock pattern with construction tips 24 pages paperback under five bucks from Track of the Wolf, Inc.
http://www.trackofthewolf.com/(S(quem4vvcivymnqnqu4ie3las))/Index.aspx

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

If it's a wheelllock you want to build, get yourself a copy of "How to Build Your Own Wheellock-Rifle or Pistol" by Georg Lauber.  It'll look something like this one...

[Clowdis]

The flint lock really was a simpler mechanism wasn't it? 

[Acer Saccharum]

We went to the flintlock because the wheellock was a pain to make, intricate, fragile, and expensive. Great ignition, I understand, but only the wealthy could afford one.

Building your own lock from scratch is a great project. I would build a few kits, work on tuning existing locks etc, before attempting a scratch built lock. This way, you slowly come to understand how they work, the geometry required to make it function well, etc.

Acer

[Stophel]

I MUST build a wheel lock rifle!

Wheel locks were used even into the 19th century!  I have seen German wheel lock rifles that have had diopter bases added in the 19th century.  They gave good ignition...faster than a flintlock, since the pyrites are already in contact with the wheel, and it begins to make sparks as soon as you pull the trigger.  With a flintlock, you have to wait for the cock to reach the frizzen before it begins to spark.

As I understand it, the problem with wheel locks (other than gumming up the wheel) is pyrite quality.  Hard to get good pyrites that spark well and stay together without crumbling.

[jerrywh]

It would take a thick book to answer this question completely. The historical arms making tech book was the best I ever saw but some of it didn't turn out to be the best way for me when I did it. I built several locks from scratch. The last one was about 1992.  Each part is a lesson in it's self.  The hardest part I ever had to learn was to forge weld the pan on the plate. The flint hammer is the next hardest. To me the springs were probably the easiest.
   Old blacksmithing books will help a lot. The correct alignment of the sear and tumbler and the architecture of the tumbler is also tricky. Dave Race is real good at teaching that stuff.
  One bad thing is a lot of people will tell you how that don't know themselves. That's confusing to say the least. Don't know why they do that??? Some of the books you get are that way also

[Canyonrun]

The Lock being Flint or percussion is pretty simple to make, my first lock still spark’s good today copy from three pictures found on WIKIANSWERS on line. I consider my self still very much apprentices in the black powder world and very grateful to come across ALR Forum to tap into the vast amount information found here that would indeed take many large books to cover it all. That being said I believe for five bucks you can’t go wrong having a copy of Lock Patterns by Pryor Newton, simple drawings for a simple lock.

[Stophel]

The cock would definitely be the most complex shape to make.  The frizzen probably the second hardest.  The rest is pretty easily forged/sawn/filed out of steel stock.  I've made a tumbler, sear, many bridles, and have made a lockplate, but have yet to use it.  A pan can even be sawn out of a block of steel....with lots of elbow grease.

I had the local machine shop make me up some "tumbler blanks" a few years ago.  Basically a 1" diameter wheel of mild steel, 1/4" thick, with one pivot shank 3/8" diameter, and the opposite shank 3/16".  I can cut my tumbler shape out of that, and turn the shanks down with a file and with the tumbler mounted into my "lathe"...a big drill sitting in my lap.