[Shop-talk] old house mortise lock tip

[David Scheidt]

I had reason recently to take apart a couple old mortise locks.  If
you've never taken one apart, they have a bunch of levers and cams, to
do the things a door lock and latch needs to do.  They also have a
bunch of springs, and use the cover to keep things together, so when
you take the cover off, it tends to disassemble itself.  And it's a
real puzzle to put back together.  If you put a screw through the
spindle holes (knob, lock thumbturn) that's got a head big ehough to
bear on the spindle but small enough to pass through the cover hole,
you can take the cover off without the main mechanism grenading.  If
you're working on the mechanism, you may have to remove the screws,
but al least you can take pictures of how it was originally.

-- 
David Scheidt
dmscheidt at gmail.com