I'm just finishing up polishing out the cast springs supplied with a TRS kit. Queen Anne Musket.
The main spring and frizzen spring came out fine. I had to heat the springs up and open up the V shape so I could polish the inside of the arms. The main spring also needed the inside of the bend cleared of cast metal.
So both of those springs now need to be heated again and bent back to shape for use. Then hardened and drawn back.
The sear spring supplied was a complete loss.
It too had casting metal in the inside of the bend. I sawed most of that way to be able to spread the arms apart once heated up red.
But the very uneven thicknesses of the two arms left me with nothing to use as a real spring once I started shaping & polishing them out.
So I decided to heat it up red again and forge the thing out flat. Then use it as a pattern to make a new spring from scratch from a piece of 1095 stock.
I forged the screw socket loop on the end of the piece of stock by just hammering from the top downward and shaping it by forging at red heat.
The rest is files and polished to shape using the old spring pattern.
I left the 'new' spring attached to the piece of spring stock so it's easier to hold on to for filing, shaping, polishing and drilling the screw hole.
It's fitted to the plate now but still attached to the piece of spring stock.
Mainspring as provided
Frizzen Spring all polished up
The sear spring supplied was a complete loss.
It too had casting metal in the inside of the bend. I sawed most of that way to be able to spread the arms apart once heated up red.
But the very uneven thicknesses of the two arms left me with nothing to use as a real spring once I started polishing them out.
So I decided to heat it up red again and forge the thing out flat. Then use it as a pattern to make a new spring from scratch from a piece of 1095 stock.
You can see the sear spring 'as cast' supplied in this pic in the upper right portion of the pic.
These are of that suppled as cast spring opened up and forged flat after realizing it was a loss.
Plus the one I made from spring stock still attached to the main piece.
I'll have to do some searching on the HT of the cast springs,,never did any before.
The 1095 one shouldn't be any problem. I use a lead pot to draw temper w/a themometer to get the temp right.
I don't think I'll be searching out anymore 'cast' springs to work on in the future.
They may be just fine as far as strength and working life.
But for all the time I put into cleaning them up from their as-cast condition to get to the straight, nicely tapered and polished condition I like them to be in,,,I could have just as well made them from scratch.
That would have been in less time and with a lot less work.
