Anyone ever try clock springs for pick material?

[Jacob Morgan]

I do a little bit of clock repair on the side, I'm not a clock maker by any means, but find mechanical clocks fascinating devices and enjoy tinkering with them and have gotten some to work again. I was looking at a clock making catalog the other day and it occurred to me that clock springs might make good pick material. It can be had in a variety of thicknesses, and it has to be of fairly good steel. Has anyone tried it before?

An example catalog page is here: http://timesavers.com/c-325731-clock-repair-replacement-parts-mainsprings-arbors-barrels-hole-end-mainsprings.html

Unwinding one of the springs without hurting oneself could be an issue, but after that so long as a piece long enough for a pick could be had without a permanent curve in it it might be a relatively inexpensive way to get some high quality steel when one considers how many feet are in one of those springs. For example, 5/16" X 0.016" X 54" for $6.00.

[femurat]

I've heard countless times that drain snake is a good material source. The idea is quite similar to yours.
Go ahead and try it, and let us know how it turns out.

Cheers

[kwoswalt99-]

I'd try it, but I think it would have to be straightened first.

[dll932]

I have not seen clock springs thick enough to make picks out of. You can flat stock from McMaster Carr, but it ain't cheap.

[MBI]

I have not seen clock springs thick enough to make picks out of. You can flat stock from McMaster Carr, but it ain't cheap.

Once I found some thick enough and it made a great slimline pick.
But as dll932 said, most clock springs are thinner than paper and might not not work well if too thin.

I still save clock springs when I run across them. You never know when it might be useful for bypass tools (won't go into detail here).

Or you could make cylinder shims for picking open an unmounted lock from the back of the lock to repin it. If you don't have any of the little shoplifter tags handy to make shims. Clock spring material is a lot like the metal they use to make Weiser shims, so you could always make your own if you can't find one to buy. Not many people carry Weiser shims anymore.

They're also great for making certain types of broken key remover since the material is thin enough to insert alongside a broken key. Just requires a little cutting, bending and in some cases sharpening to make a good extractor out of it.

So in short, clock springs are awesome for all kinds of lock related stuff.
Picks just usually isn't one of them.

[Jacob Morgan]

Go ahead and try it, and let us know how it turns out.
Cheers

Went ahead and ordered a few to experiment with (from the source listed in a previous post). Clock springs do come in heavier thicknesses for mantle clocks, wind up grandmother clocks, etc. The .008 thickness was for a different project. The ones for picks were between 0.0165" and 0.02".



Unwound one of the 0.02" X 5/16" springs. There was some curvature in the spring. the photo below is after shearing off about 6".



The piece sheared off was ground into a pick. It was fabulous steel. Very hard but not brittle. The sparks off the grinder showed very high carbon content. It was not the easiest metal to grind away. It felt harder than shim stock that I've ground before and much harder than bandsaw blade material that I have used recently.



The pick worked fine, but I was wondering how much usable steel there was given the curvature of the spring. Tired bending it by hand but started getting some uneven bends in it. If this were a industrial plant metal that has curvature would be ran through a tension-leveler. That is a series of rollers that bend the metal repeatedly up and down and each bend is past the yield strength (or something like that). Those machines use some serious motors to pull the metal through. I thought that maybe something like that could be done. Found some angle iron with holes punched in them (came with a garage door opener?) and found some bolts. Alexander Weygers's The Complete Modern Blacksmith describes a similar method to straighten bent wire.





After threading the strip I pulled it through with a pair of pliers--if it is not hard to pull through it is not doing anything.

That did not remove all the curvature but reduced it a lot and got rid of the uneven bends I put in it. Clock makers have gizmos for winding springs and probably if one had one of those and would up the spring in the opposite direction it would remove all of the curvature. Only problem is they cost a couple of hundred dollars, but a handy person might be able to make one with some scrap. Heating it red hot would probably make it easier to straighten, but I liked the heat treatment that the steel came with and did not want to have to re-harden and temper it.

Sheared the remaining stock into 6" lengths. For those lengths there was no curvature or what curvature there was it was removed by hand. The last several inches were unusable.



Six pieces plus the pick already made, material for seven picks with really good (German?) steel for $2, could do worse.

[Big Jesse]

I've heard countless times that drain snake is a good material source. The idea is quite similar to yours.
Go ahead and try it, and let us know how it turns out.

Cheers

Jruther2 over in keypicking made me a pair of picks out of drain snake, and its the strongest set of picks i own! I have over 10 different brands of picks, and 10 different homebrews ranging from Ratyokes to Violator picks, but the Jruther2 picks made from drain snake metal is by far the best metal i have used.

[MBI]

Nice work Jacob. I especially like that straightening jig you made. Clever.

When I experimented with clock springs I straightened them by hand (difficult to do nice job, like you mentioned), used a wet grinder for most of the shaping and touched up the work with hand files.

[femurat]

Great job man! I like the straightening jig too.

In situations like this one, would be ideal to contact the manufacturer and get the metal before they roll it. Sadly it's almost impossible, so we have to buy it rolled and try to unbend it.

Cheers

[Jacob Morgan]

In situations like this one, would be ideal to contact the manufacturer and get the metal before they roll it. Sadly it's almost impossible, so we have to buy it rolled and try to unbend it.

Cheers

You got me interested in chasing this down. I remember seeing a video of a clock maker who was winding up springs from flat stock, so someone has to be selling it. Did some looking and apparently clock springs are made from SAE 1095 "polished blue tempered" steel. There is an outfit that sells it here http://www.admiralsteel.com That outfit does sell some steel retail (it looks like they serve custom knife makers) but I'm not sure that it would be realistic to order from them for that item unless one wanted a full-coil quantity. But their site does have some good info on the metal, including heat treatment information, in case someone wanted to anneal it then re-harden it. In thicker gauges it appears that 1095 steel is also used for knife blades.

For smaller quantities McMaster-Carr sells it. 0.02" X 5/16" by 25 feet for $33 (they also sell 0.016 but that is a little thin). http://www.mcmaster.com/#grade-1095-steel/=11ggh7y

MSC Industrial also sells it, 0.02" X 1/4 by 52 feet for $34 (they also sell 0.018" and wider widths). https://www.mscdirect.com/browse/tn/Raw-Materials/Steel-Coils?searchterm=1095+steel&navid=4287924490#navid=4287924490+4288247500+4288143949+4288246925&searchterm=1095+steel

Guess is that McMaster-Carr metal may be domestic, but who knows. McMaster-Carr, used to at least, would email or fax spec sheets to people who asked for them. In the old days having a recent McMaster-Carr catalog on the shelf was a status symbol in any industrial plant. The company was stingy with them. But I digress.

52 feet of steel would make a lot of picks. And it would not be rolled up tightly like clock springs.

[femurat]

You did your homework Jacob

Now we just need someone that buys the 52 feet, cuts ten pieces out of it, makes and ship 5 envelopes with 2 pieces taped in each one and we are done.
I'm one of the 5 happy pick makers that would be interested.

Just kidding

[FoxMacLeod2501]

You did your homework Jacob

Now we just need someone that buys the 52 feet, cuts ten pieces out of it, makes and ship 5 envelopes with 2 pieces taped in each one and we are done.
I'm one of the 5 happy pick makers that would be interested.

Just kidding

I would love to try some of that metal, too.

[femurat]

Here's another idea. An old rolling shutter broke and I managed to save its spring. It's way too big for euro picks but should be just right for us ones.

Cheers