Bad work, good info.

  Well, after some serious examination, I have decided to scrap part of the hinges.  Part of the hinge, the way I made it, could suffer easily from metal fatigue.  This is were a piece of metal is flexed back and forth until it finally breaks.  Springs don't suffer from this as much as other metal.  In the case of the chest, the hinges may have held out for years or they may have broken the first time it was opened.  So, I've lost a lot of the past few days.
  However, I did learn something valuable from this experience.  When I first made some of my chisels, I tended to make them much more thicker than say a normal woodworking chisel.  Think of something in the shape of traffic cone.  Well, I decided to thin one of my chisels to be more in the shape of some of the ones I've seen other smiths using.  I was worried about taking the blade too thin because of the heat.  I was worried the thin metal would get too hot, too fast.  Well, I was surprised as hell when I used the thin chisel for the first time.  I was able to cut through almost 1/4" steel with one hit.  This compares to 5 or 6 hits using a thicker chisel.  Also, it tends to push less metal out of the way so cleanup is easier.  I guess all that experience of other smiths should be a lesson to me...  :)
  The second bit of good news, and this was a biggie, is that my recent contact sent me a detailed line drawing of the type of lock I need to make.  This came from the museum which houses the chest.  The line drawing answered all of my questions.  I am very happy to say that all my theories on the operation were correct.  The line drawing did show me a few features that will make the lock more reliable.  The line drawing is below.  The key is inserted, turned until teeth on the key push some springs up(top of the drawing), then the key is used to slide the lock to the left in this drawing.  The key cannot be removed until the bolt is back in the locked position.  Modern keyholes are the exact shape of the key.  The keyhole on this lock is actually used to slide the key to move the bolt.

Hot damn!  (no blacksmithing pun intended)

  Well, digging around on the internet paid off.  I found the gentleman who made a reproduction of the same chest.  He sent me some info along with some pics with promises to send me more.  The best part was that he sent me a close up of the key.  Its shape and cut is pretty much exactly what I expected.  He will hopefully be sending me more but the shape of the key confirms almost 100% my theory on the locks operation.  I've included the picture sent to me below.

One set of hinges done...

  I just finished one set of hinges.  While things didn't go as smoothly as I would have liked, I learned some more methods.  I could have saved myself quite a bit of time today but had to restart a few times as I worked to figure out how to do things.

  Perhaps the best thing that I learned today involved a weld that I had to do.  Welding in blacksmithing is far more difficult than it is using a modern oxy/act or arc welder.  Well, I needed to weld a small piece of metal onto a part of the hinge.  The problem was that I couldn't figure out how to keep it there when doing the welding.  Then, I remembered something I saw on a special on making swords.

  When making authentic swords, you start with small billets of steel which are welded together, folded and rewelded over and over.  This is done for many reasons but what I remembered was that the small billets were held together in various ways.  The method that I utilized was to take steel wire and wrap around the pieces to hold them together.  I was able to use this to do one of the best welds I've ever done.  When I make the second hinge, I will post pictures and it should make more sense.

  The hinge is shown below.  It is about 14 inches long.
 

Good day, so far.

  Taking a lunch time break and also a break to look at a new CD that just arrived in the mail.  It is a lot of information on how to smelt iron(extract iron from ore).  A future project that I thought would be fun at an SCA event such as Gulf Wars is a multiple day demo of starting with ore and eventually producing some simple tools with the iron that was smelted.  Anyway, I'm getting off track.

  I was able to finish one half of a hinge.  I'm going to head back out and try to finish the other half.  It actually went pretty well.  I tried one technique for making the hinge which didn't come out like I wanted.  Tried a second way and that was fine.  I also punched the holes for the nails.  I'm not worried about perfectly centering the nail holes as the nail heads will not be centered on the nail shaft.  When I go to put the nails in I can rotate the nails to make everything look nice.  I went ahead and blackened the hinge with oil to protect it from rust.

Frustration...

  So, I've looked at the lock on the chest as much as I can.  The problem is that the catalog illustrations just are not that complete.  Well, I think I have found a gentleman that did a reproduction for ABANA (a national blacksmithing group) and I'm hoping he has some insight into the lock.  I sent an email hoping to get some insight from him.  I THINK I know how it works but I don't have enough confidence to proceed until I confirm it or have no other choice.  So, I'm going to put the lock part of the chest aside for the moment.  Between the hinges and nails, I have enough work for a few weeks.

Whoops...

  So I had some nervous energy and decided to go ahead and file the lock plate.  Went pretty well until I got to one corner.  After a minute or so of futility I realized that I must have accidentally hardened the corner.  When steel is harded, it is very difficult to file.  I probably quenched the steel when it was at the right temperature.  So, I left the corner until I can soften it in the forge again.
  I was also happy because there were a few holes that were close to the edge.  After the filling, there is still enough metal to keep the nail from breaking out the side.  From what I can see from the original, this may have happened at one spot.
  Tomorrow, I need to pick up some steel for the nails.  I don't have any stock thin enough and I don't want to spend an hour thinning down metal just to make nails.  I also hope to go ahead and get the keyhole punched.
  Right now I'm watching a special on Heron of Alexandria.  I've seen it before and it amazes me what he was able to do.  The automatic theater is of particular interest.  After I complete the clock, I may try to recreate some of his items.  The omen machine is also pretty cool.

Whole lotta holes...

  I have the rest of the week of for the holidays so spent time on the forge today.  I decided to work on the lock plate for the chest that I'm working on.  The first order of business was to harden the punch I made a few days ago and to put a handle on it.  Next, I cut a wooden template for the plate.  After further study, I decided to go with a size of 3 1/4" x 18".  This is very close to the actual size.  Anyway, I cut the wooden template to help me cut and trim the plate properly to size.  That went easier then expected.  After the plate was cut to proper size, I moved to the nail holes in the plate.

  The original plate had 18 holes in it.  I added an additional two holes to the design simple to secure the ends a bit more.  Not really a significant change.  Well, I was able to punch the holes fairly quickly.  I had to frequently stop to do some cleanup on the punch.  Because of its contact with the hot metal, it is easy to deform the punch.  On the good news front, this is the first time I have done a lot of punching.  I've done a few here and there for tongs and the like but this is the first time I've had to do a lot of holes.  Other than a few minor errors(which are easy to fix or conceal) they came out pretty good.

  My biggest fear was the amount of metal left on the outside edge of the plate by the holes.  The act of punching causes the metal to push out a little.  To fix this, I simple file the bulge away.  I wanted to make sure the holes were very close to the edge but not so close that the hole breaks out the side.  Other than one or two close ones, when I do the filing, it should come out pretty good.

  I've included a pic of the plate below.  The bulges around the holes can be seen.  Next, I will file around the holes to restraighten the edge.  After that, comes the keyhole then the holes for the locking mechanism and the latches that the lock engages.  I should be able to get a lot of that done over this weekend.