I need help with a TRS Baker Rifle flintlock build

[FlinterNick]

A few things I found very helpful when working on a casted tumbler was 1. Making a triangular needle file with a safe edge, and a wooden block with a tumbler cut out as a vice helps a lot for stoning and polishing.

 

[FlinterNick]

Thankyou Dave, that is a terrific help.

I am delighted to advise that I have had a response from Ethan at Track of the Wolf overnight and he has a Tumbler, bridle and fly in stock for my lock so I’m going to buy those from him and will start from scratch with those parts following the terrific advice that I’ve received here from yourself, Gus, Nick and co. I’ll have no excuses for not getting them right this time.

But I will still press on with having a go at fixing my mess on these parts that I already have, knowing the replacement parts are coming I can have a bit more confidence that if I completely ruin them I won’t be left with a useless pile of rifle parts.

Track of the Wolf has great customer service, it would be nice if the Rifle Shoppe would source out some of their service needs but a small shop like theirs probably cant afford too much Assistance.

 

[Artificer]

A little trick I use when working on the full cock notch is to put Dykem or Magic Marker on the curved surface of the tumbler below it. Then I take a square and align it to the side of the body and with a blunt point, scribe a line over the marked part close to the edge of the full cock notch. The scribed line is perpendicular to the body of the Tumbler and is used as a guide. This helps me continue to check to ensure the full cock is perpendicular to the body of the Tumbler as I work it.

I was also taught to put the body of the tumbler in a smooth jawed machinist vise and align the full cock notch with the angle I wanted to put on it. Then lay a piece of shim stock on top of the vise to protect the jaws, while I lay the file or stone on that and file/stone the full cock. This is not as easy as it sounds, though.

Actually, though this doesn't sound as accurate as the paragraph above and for me personally, I hold the tumbler in my left hand while working on the full cock notch. I find that better for me to work the full cock.

Gus

 

[Larks]

Nicely done! At full cock and while holding the cock the entire time, can you lift up on the tail of the sear and the sear will now go smoothly into the half cock? (To test the half cock safety feature?)

Gus

No it doesn’t - but is this a trick question? If I ease the cock forward after lifting the sear to clear the cock notch it slides over the fly, at the some forcing the fly forward into the front (left) of the fly recess in the tumbler and so covering the half cock notch, preventing the sear from being able to land back in the half cock notch while the cock is moving forward. But I thought that’s what it is intended to do?? as in to stop it from landing on the half cock if the trigger is released too quickly - ie without any follow through.....????

 

[Larks]

A little trick I use when working on the full cock notch is to put Dykem or Magic Marker on the curved surface of the tumbler below it. Then I take a square and align it to the side of the body and with a blunt point, scribe a line over the marked part close to the edge of the full cock notch. The scribed line is perpendicular to the body of the Tumbler and is used as a guide. This helps me continue to check to ensure the full cock is perpendicular to the body of the Tumbler as I work it.

I was also taught to put the body of the tumbler in a smooth jawed machinist vise and align the full cock notch with the angle I wanted to put on it. Then lay a piece of shim stock on top of the vise to protect the jaws, while I lay the file or stone on that and file/stone the full cock. This is not as easy as it sounds, though.

Actually, though this doesn't sound as accurate as the paragraph above and for me personally, I hold the tumbler in my left hand while working on the full cock notch. I find that better for me to work the full cock.

Gus

I did scribe the line to the centre of the tumbler axle and all of that as you guys had advised, used aluminium jaws in the vice and a fine cornered vice to cut back the notch angle. However I didn’t anneal the tumbler, having previously case hardened it, so cutting it back is a little more work than it could otherwise be. I’d like to avoid annealing and re-hardening it as I used a weld bond with the screw that I plugged my crooked cock screw hole with before redialing it straight. It’s only good to about 500F

 

[Artificer]

No it doesn’t - but is this a trick question? If I ease the cock forward after lifting the sear to clear the cock notch it slides over the fly, at the some forcing the fly forward into the front (left) of the fly recess in the tumbler and so covering the half cock notch, preventing the sear from being able to land back in the half cock notch while the cock is moving forward. But I thought that’s what it is intended to do?? as in to stop it from landing on the half cock if the trigger is released too quickly - ie without any follow through.....????

No, it is not a trick question. I think you may not totally understand the function of the Fly.

I'll explain more in my next post, but since I was writing another post elsewhere on the forum, I thought I'd better let you know I didn't go away while I'm writing more.

Gus

 

[Sam squanch]

The more I read this, the more I appreciate the miquelet lock…..

 

[4575wcf]

You are doing fine in the big picture. When I was starting out building parts for my various projects I had a self imposed rule to NEVER work on a part I could not get. Otherwise, if I could order a replacement tumbler for instance, I would keep fitting til I ruined three of them if necessary before I got the geometry all figured out and understood it. The trick is to not settle for less than what you want to see in your work. There is no way to learn to do this work without making mistakes, so accept that fact, relax and keep getting better. All the parts have to work in unison, attention to detail and getting all the geometry of the working surfaces correct to one another is the key. A sloppy fit in the castings where the shanks must fit tightly in the accepting holes will screw you up every time, so best to correct those at the get go. I am enjoying following this lock build, keep thinking it out and go easy and you will get there.

 

[Artificer]

No it doesn’t - but is this a trick question? If I ease the cock forward after lifting the sear to clear the cock notch it slides over the fly, at the some forcing the fly forward into the front (left) of the fly recess in the tumbler and so covering the half cock notch, preventing the sear from being able to land back in the half cock notch while the cock is moving forward. But I thought that’s what it is intended to do?? as in to stop it from landing on the half cock if the trigger is released too quickly - ie without any follow through.....????

OK, in a lock without a Fly, the constant trigger pressure one applies after the Sear drops below the full cock notch, will keep the Sear Nose from hitting the Half Cock notch as the Tumbler rotates forward. The Sear Spring always exerts pressure downward on the Sear which normally forces the Sear Nose up into the Full or Half Cock Notch. The pressure of your trigger finger forces the tail of the Sear upwards and that overcomes the pressure of the Sear Spring. BTW, this is why you don't need a Fly in a lock, if there is no set trigger in the gun.

When they began using set triggers, there no longer is continuing finger pressure on the Sear to keep it out of the way of the Half Cock notch as the Tumbler rotates forward. Set triggers, whether single or double triggers, operate off releasing a spring which causes the top of one trigger just to smack the tail of the Sear upwards to release the Sear nose, BUT it doesn't apply constant pressure against the Sear Spring to keep the Sear Nose from dropping into the Half Cock when you intend to fire it. IOW, after the top of the Trigger smacks the tail of the sear driving it upwards, the Sear Spring will try to force the Sear Tail down as soon as it travels as far up as it got smacked. There is a small amount of time before the Sear Spring forces the Sear Nose back down completely where it would engage the Half Cock Notch. While the Tumbler is rotating and BEFORE the Sear Spring can force the Sear Nose into the Half Cock notch, the Sear Nose hits the Fly, which causes the Sear Nose to pass over the Half Cock. Again, this is when you are intentionally trying to have the lock fire the gun.

Now the Safety Feature of the Half Cock is in case you cock the Cock/Hammer or it snags on brush so the Cock/Hammer is unintentionally cocked partially or fully, but you are not yet ready to intentionally fire the gun. You DON'T want the Sear Nose slipping off the Full Cock notch until you intend to fire it. If the Cock/Hammer is only partially cocked unintentionally, the Half Cock Notch keeps the lock from going off by the Sear catching in the Half Cock Notch. If the Cock/Hammer is Fully Cocked and the Gun is bumped hard or dropped and unintentionally releases the Sear from the full cock notch, the Sear goes into the Half Cock notch and should keep the lock from working unintentionally, so you don't blow a hole in you or anything else you don't want.

Unfortunately, the width of your Fly defeats this Safety Feature, because it keeps the Nose of the Sear from going into the Half Cock Notch when you don't mean to fire it.

Gus

 

[Larks]

I think you’re right Gus, I don’t fully understand the function of the fly. I’d been working on the basis of what B.E. Spencer described in his “Basic Lock Function” essay (which I found incredibly useful - thanks for putting me onto that).

"The second method involves the use of a fly in the tumbler (H), and is the method which must be used if a set trigger is used. A set trigger functions quite differently than a simple trigger. A set trigger is a self-contained mechanism on its own, designed so that when the trigger is fired, a bar snaps upward, striking the sear bar of the lock and knocking the sear nose from the full-cock notch. Once this has happened, though, the trigger bar instantly falls away, releasing all pressure on the sear bar, allowing the sear spring to force the nose of the sear back into contact with the tumbler. Unless something is done to prevent it, the sear pawl will fall into the half-cock notch. The fly is there just to prevent that from happening. The fly is a little piece-of-pie shaped metal part that pivots in a hole drilled on the tumbler, at the tip of a similarly shaped slot in the tumbler, right above the half - and full-cock notches. It is free to rotate a few degrees, and is positioned and shaped to prevent the problem we are concerned with. When the pawl of the sear is forced from the full-cock notch and the tumbler starts its sudden and rapid rotation, inertia makes the fly hold still, and this results in its rotating into a position to prevent the sear pawl from engaging the half-cock notch. The lower edge of the fly is shaped so that it forces the pawl to ride over the half-cock notch before making full contact with the tumbler, again...."

But the Baker Rifle doesn’t have a set trigger (at least so far as I understand a set trigger) so I am indeed confused about it’s function on this rifle.

To be honest I’m struggling to see how this fly can do anything else but prevent the sear from going into the the half cock notch as the cock comes forward. The photo below is the old one before I cleaned it up but it shows that the half cock notch would sit pretty much in the middle of the fly when the fly comes forward so I can’t see that it can modified to do anything else....???