Wannabe gunsmiths
Today I'm repairing a few locks.
The one I'm working on at the moment was returned because it wouldn't stay in full cock. The guy called up and left a rude message on our voicemail, then sent a rude message to Wendy's email. Typical bully crap, where he felt the need to seem powerful and important. Long story short, I asked him to send the lock back for repairs.
As I took the lock apart, it became very obvious to me why it wouldn't stay in full cock. HE MESSED WITH IT! You can see the plier marks where he held the tumbler and ground the working surface of the full cock notch. Why? Who knows! Maybe tried to give it a trigger job? The full cock notch is now at an angle, with the face of it no longer parallel to the axis of the tumbler shaft.
For whatever reason, he worked his magic on the half cock notch as well, entirely eliminating the lip that holds the sear from slipping forward when you pull the trigger. In effect, what he did was to stop the full cock notch from being functional and turn the half cock notch into a full cock notch.
I can fix this. It's simple locksmithing. What annoys me is that this guy screwed up the lock, then tried to blame the gun for what he did. He had just enough knowledge to get himself in trouble, then tried to pass the buck-and did it in a rude, bully-like way.
I'll be the first to say that the only real way to learn to fix guns is to fix guns. Sometimes you mess up, but that's par for the course. Where this guy went wrong was to mess up, then lie to me and say that the gun was broken.
Why can't some people just be honest? Did he think we were not going to notice radical changes to a tumbler?
Here are some pictures of the tumbler as returned to me:
In this one, you can see the goofy new angle that was put on the full cock notch, and the ruined half cock notch
Here's a different camera angle, showing the weird new angle the full cock notch is at.
A different view of the same thing, only more clearly showing the file marks on the tumbler from the attempted gunsmithing.
And another.
If he were just honest about it, and had told me that he was messing with it and got in over his head, I would still have fixed it for him. The reason I'm so annoyed with this situation is that he instead tried to bully us into fixing it to cover up his mistake. ANYONE who wants to hang out here and learn how to work on flintlocks is welcome, so there is no reason for this kind of sillyness.
The one I'm working on at the moment was returned because it wouldn't stay in full cock. The guy called up and left a rude message on our voicemail, then sent a rude message to Wendy's email. Typical bully crap, where he felt the need to seem powerful and important. Long story short, I asked him to send the lock back for repairs.
As I took the lock apart, it became very obvious to me why it wouldn't stay in full cock. HE MESSED WITH IT! You can see the plier marks where he held the tumbler and ground the working surface of the full cock notch. Why? Who knows! Maybe tried to give it a trigger job? The full cock notch is now at an angle, with the face of it no longer parallel to the axis of the tumbler shaft.
For whatever reason, he worked his magic on the half cock notch as well, entirely eliminating the lip that holds the sear from slipping forward when you pull the trigger. In effect, what he did was to stop the full cock notch from being functional and turn the half cock notch into a full cock notch.
I can fix this. It's simple locksmithing. What annoys me is that this guy screwed up the lock, then tried to blame the gun for what he did. He had just enough knowledge to get himself in trouble, then tried to pass the buck-and did it in a rude, bully-like way.
I'll be the first to say that the only real way to learn to fix guns is to fix guns. Sometimes you mess up, but that's par for the course. Where this guy went wrong was to mess up, then lie to me and say that the gun was broken.
Why can't some people just be honest? Did he think we were not going to notice radical changes to a tumbler?
Here are some pictures of the tumbler as returned to me:
In this one, you can see the goofy new angle that was put on the full cock notch, and the ruined half cock notch
Here's a different camera angle, showing the weird new angle the full cock notch is at.
A different view of the same thing, only more clearly showing the file marks on the tumbler from the attempted gunsmithing.
And another.
If he were just honest about it, and had told me that he was messing with it and got in over his head, I would still have fixed it for him. The reason I'm so annoyed with this situation is that he instead tried to bully us into fixing it to cover up his mistake. ANYONE who wants to hang out here and learn how to work on flintlocks is welcome, so there is no reason for this kind of sillyness.
posted by MVTCoPete | 5:20 PM
2 Comments:
I'd love to hang out at your shop and learn about gunsmithing locks. I love it, but I am at that stage where I need some guidance as to the proper geometries etc. Now I end up having to remake sears and tumblers from scratch and start shaving away....
There are some good books on the subject, but all of that is theory. The only way to learn how to do it is to do it. Sure, you'll mess up a few parts, but you'll learn from each mistake.
Just keep in mind that we have all sorts of modern technology at our disposal whereas the guys who invented this stuff had files and hammers. Can you imagine what one of those old gunsmiths would have accomplished if they had something as basic as a Dremel tool?
It is probably best to NOT use a power tool though, as it is easy to take off too much metal and it is a lot of work to put it back on. Files and India stones are the order of the day until you get REALLY good with something as aggressive as a Dremel tool.
Keep at it, it will come to you with practice!
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