Lets ID this cannonball safe.

I snagged another cannonball today when it turned up on Craigslist. I wasn't planning on adding to the fleet but it was different and the price was right, so what the hell, number 14 safe. There is not any lettering on it and I think the base is repainted. More than likely that is where the name was. The top is original and there is enough of the artwork to duplicate it. It says MANGANESE STEEL MONEY CHEST on the etched nickel plated front door cover. There is also a patent tag riveted to the hinge that says PATENTED NOV 11 1902 and SEPT 6 1904.

It has a lug door with a mechanism mounted near the hinge that locks the door from rotating when it is opened. Has a Yale lock and a Yale time lock inside. There is an inner compartment with a key lock door that removes instead of being hinged. I did a search on line and could not find a similar safe. My gut tells me it is a Manganese Safe Company safe, what say you experts?


Attachment 18395
Attachment 18398
Attachment 18396
Attachment 18397

Sorry I can't help identifying the safe. But I've seen some of your restorations and can't wait to follow this one. I'm sure it'll be amazing.

Cheers :)

National Bankers Chest.


The most distinguishing fact is the bolt pattern on the front bearing plate. National used this pattern on most all their Cannon Balls, Screw door and Lug door Bankers Chests.


The pull handles, body hinges, and pedestal all are representative of National.


DH

Thank you for the reply, David. Is that the full name of the company? I did a quick google search and did not come up with much. Do you have any info on the company or their products? Perhaps Doug will look in his magic hat and come up with something.

It certainly is different than the usual cannonballs/bank safes that turn up. It will fit in well with some of the other oddballs I have.

I did find this reference:

In 1920, Steelcraft Corporation of America took over the assets of the National Safe Company. The company made fire and burgular proof safes, vault doors, safe deposit boxes, money chests and other security related items.

The page also had this picture of a cannonball. There are similarities.

Attachment 18400

After an exhaustive search I finally found another National safe that is the same. From an Ebay auction back in 2012 only one image has been recovered so far, a side image, it is an exact match. I have been in contact with the lock shop that sold it and they are looking for the original pictures. While I couldn’t come up with much on National Safe there are some examples of the tradition square safes, but very little on their cannonball or other bank safes.

Attachment 18418

I now have the safe home and took a closer look at its construction and lock. The castings of the body and base are of high quality. Much better than my Victor cannonball or Mosler screw doors. It seems to be a very well made safe.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...8/mw5ocm-1.jpg

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../1687rc3-1.jpg

The Yale lock and time lock are a little different setup and hope some of you can tell more about it. On my other rotating door bank safes the combination lock (day lock) controls the movement of the door on the front of the door. The time lock controls separate locking action to secure the door on the inside. On this National, the dial is recessed into the door and the spindle passes through to the lock case on the back side of the door. The spindle gear drives the wheel pack (4 wheels) which then drives another gear on the fence similar to a friction fence model but the fence is spring operated. The lock needed a severe cleaning as it looked like it was lubed with axle grease.. The lock bolt directly moves the 4 door bolts through linkage. This National is probably not as secure as others because of the spindle hole to the inside.
The time lock only disables the combination lock when the snubber bar moves and allows a pivoting lever to lock the fence action. Can anyone shed some light on this setup? Here it is with the time lock in both positions.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2r2awar-1.jpg


https://www.antique-locks.com/images...8/i2r03s-1.jpg

I was pleased to find that the original carpets were intact. I didn’t know what to expect inside as the lady who was selling it had it stuffed full when I looked at it. A close inspection of the inside turned up some goodies. Under the lower carpet were 3 paper clips, a petrified rubber band, 2 bent wire things, 2 quarters 1972 & 1979, a 1899 dime, and a 1906 Indian head penny. Wedged in a corner space of the upper shelf was a time lock winding key and a very rare original key for the Yale time lock door. Always fun to find something.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by 00247

Thank you for the reply, David. Is that the full name of the company? I did a quick google search and did not come up with much. Do you have any info on the company or their products? Perhaps Doug will look in his magic hat and come up with something.

It certainly is different than the usual cannonballs/bank safes that turn up. It will fit in well with some of the other oddballs I have.

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Is that the full name of the company?

Nice find on that National. On the castings, I believe they were made by TISCO Taylor Iron and Steel Co. A general identifier on day locks on cannonballs is that the dial is not recessed. Not true on all but is for most. If it is recessed then the comb lock is deep in the door. Which also means it will not be an automatic. Mating time locks into comb locks goes way back and there are many different setups. . A S&G version time lock and comb were shown in "American Genius". It took me a moment to realize the S&G Cleoh name stood for Cleveland Ohio, National made all kinds of safes and bank vaults, starting in 1882, incorporated in 1883.

David, that picture is from the same Ebay auction I mentioned. Do you have any more of them? I have not yet had a reply from the shop in Pueblo, CO. My National was not lettered like that one. That safe was redone so who knows if it is accurate. I have searched the base on this one carefully and got down to the original paint. Only the base had been repainted. No evidence of any lettering. I did find a little gold leaf on the top of the safe between the top stripe and the stripe on the front so I believe National Safe and Lock Co. was at the top.

Thanks Doug for your input. I am surprised more information on National is not available. Virtually nothing turns up online. I am pretty good at digging up old documents, newspapers, or trade paper articles but am coming up empty handed this time. I can't find anything on the 1904 and 1906 patents claimed on the tag either. I found another tidbit about Steelcraft buying National which apparently went through a change at one point.


The Steelcraft Corporation of America is a Delaware corporation organized last May to take over the business of the National Safe Company which had acquired the business of the National Safe & Lock Company that was organized In 1884 The product consists of Are and burglar proof bank vaults chests safety deposit boxes and similar devices The Steelcraft Corporation proposes to extend the business through the purchase of other plants operating In the same lines and will operate under much the same management that handled the affairs of the National Safe Company for a number of years with the addition of representatives of the HW Dubiske Co which is doing the present financing There is now being offered an additional $500,000 of 1 preferred stock bringing the outstanding amount of this is are up to $662,500 of an authorized $3,000 000 There will also be outstanding 6,625 shares of the class A common stock and 30.000 shares of class B common The statement of the company adjusted to include the proceeds of this financing indicates total assets of $1,205,827 and after deducting $69,000 of bonds and the current liabilities there are net assets of about $880,000 to apply against the outstanding capital stock These figures do not include any value that attaches to the two patents covering the construction of fire proof safes and vault doors

I have been painstakingly documenting the artwork. There is just enough to get it back to original. I have it mapped out full size for reference. It will all be corrected on computer.

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I did some disassembly on the door and was amazed at what I found. First I discovered that there is a bearing at the base of the hinge, very nice.

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When I pulled the door cover I was shocked at what I found. The door is supported by two trolleys mounted to the door pivot shafts by bearings. The trolleys run in grooves machined into the door cover. They are adjusted by turning the large decorative finials which are threaded onto the shafts. This adjusts the door vertically. The shafts pass through over sized holes in the hinge cradle. These shafts are adjusted horizontally by four set screws on the cradle. Quite a bit different than what Victor or Mosler used.

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https://www.antique-locks.com/images...9/ifc3l3-1.jpg

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../33ugaap-1.jpg

Found the numbers under the top hinge finial.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2h8251g-1.jpg

I am not sure if I have all the National patents but I do have several of them including some regarding the door carriage. I also have some other National history as well as pictures of several cannonballs and earlier round door laminated chests. One I worked on several years ago had original paint and looks a lot like yours. My current problem is I am unable to load pictures on the forum due to my crappy notebook which I need to replace.

I did some disassembly on the door today. First, to figure out how to get the dial and spindle out and also, to go through some practice assembly runs so I know what to expect when assembling with new paint. I had assumed that with a hole through the door perhaps this National is less secure. Never assume.

Previously I had removed the insides of the lock but the spindle was held in place inside the door somewhere. I removed the time lock and lock case only to discover a 1/2 inch thick steel plate covering door bolt linkage.

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Four slotted bolts and it came off. There are a lot of moving pieces to the door bolt linkage but it is simple enough.

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Next, I removed the 12 3/4 inch bots that hold on the door lug ring. All the bolts on this safe are British Whitworth threads and most have an odd number of threads per inch for their diameter. This revealed what was holding the spindle shaft in place. A threaded bung that is locked in place by a flat head screw in the threads.

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Once this bung is screwed out it reveals a very stout spindle shaft that has a taper on the shaft that matches a taper machined in the door. This along with the thick threaded bung would prevent nitro from being introduced and would make punching the dial a pointless endeavor. To reduce excessive drag on the taper, it was lubricated with a graphite grease.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../11c8vmr-1.jpg

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2gxrbzs-1.jpg


The dial is just a tight slip on fit. It has a square shaft with one angle corner so it can only go on one way.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2w2hao6-1.jpg

After removing the door lug ring there were thin pieces of card stock stuck between the the ring and the main door. Some were several thick, perhaps to act as shims?

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...9/ivy15d-1.jpg

Upon closer inspection I noticed printing and writing on them. All together there were 31 of them and they turned out to be cut up employee time cards. Some of them matched up and provide a few interesting tidbits. Most of the time cards are from June 1906 and show working hours of 10 - 11 hours. Here are some fit together to show the top of a National Safe and Lock time card.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...9/5zgyhd-1.jpg

Two pieces that match have writing on the back. It says:
Serial 249
Case 7932
Move 33197-198-1??
Motor 1149

Another piece shows the same case number but has the numbers 33577-578-???

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...9/juelxg-1.jpg

My National is number 32650 which becomes a bit confusing. It is a smaller/earlier number but had to be assembled after these time cards. I can only speculate that perhaps the numbers ran concurrently across all models of safes (Mosler numbers did) and the cannonballs/bank chests took longer to complete than the standard square safes.

This safe has had some surprises and has been a real joy to work on.

Interesting, thank you for the break down. Enjoy seeing the mechanics on these old chests!

I hope you don't have a fight on your hands reassembling the lug ring? I've learned the hard way and never remove the paper shims when I'm serving a lug door bearing plate. Had a headache of a time trying to re-align a large Diebold money chest so the door would close and rotate smoothly.

If you need more NS&L pics PM me your email address and I can send them over in full resolution.

DH

Thanks for the words of advise, David. I assembled the door completely for practice and adjusted the dial ring, the dial/spindle are quite smooth now. I put the lug ring on without shims and spent a couple hours playing with door adjustments to get the door to turn properly. The biggest issue was worn shafts in the top carriage that the rollers spin on. They are lightly pressed in the casting so I rotated them 180 degrees and that made a world of difference. New shafts will be made. I tried switching the carriages top to bottom as the top one carries the weight but they are not drilled the same for the door cover so it would not fit.

Once adjusted, the door turned nicely without the shims despite no lubrication. I will have to shim it again as several of the 12 bolts (I numbered there positions upon disassembly) that hold the lug ring on have ground corners on them to miss the inner support for the compartment door. In order to get those bolts to line up I will have to shim .020 to .025 with shim stock.

I received some pictures of an identical National safe in Arkansas from a member on another forum. It has been redone by the bank that displays it with no respect for originality. He has knowledge of the safe and has access to it. Here are a couple pictures. PMing for the additional pictures. Thanks

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2z9l91w-1.jpg

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...9/m7ch82-1.jpg

Here is an update on the National Bank chest. I haven't been breaking any records but have been plugging along on this project as time permits. First the inside was sandblasted as it was a mess of peeling paint. There was a lot of residual mortar left especially in the corners. This body is cast in one piece and it seems they used a wooden plug covered with mortar to create the inner cavity. The inside was very rough where the manganese reacted with the mortar and there were nails fused to the inside surface. The manganese is extremely hard and grinding some of the lumps was a slooow process. The outside of the casting was pretty good although one bad spot was filled with lead.

Inside after blasting, still some mortar left and nails.

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Naked and proud. Just like Charlie Rose.

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Door hinge casting has a lot of flaws.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../105s9qu-1.jpg

A major flaw in the body casting that was repaired with lead.

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It took a lot of body work on the body and the cast base to shape them up for an automotive quality paint job. Hours and hours of filler/sanding/filler/sanding and more hours of filler and sanding. Eventually it starts to shape up.

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Once satisfied with the overall shape, it is time for a substantial coat of urethane primer. Then comes the process of block sanding the surface to get it as close to perfect as possible. I used wet sanding with mostly 400 grit initially. It takes a ton of time to block the flat areas, corners, and the base. Most of the initial primer gets sanded off and the surface is shaping up nicely.

In primer and some polyester filler touching up pinholes, sand scratches, and other minor flaws. It is just thin filler, most gets sanded off.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2iub7ky-1.jpg

Wet sanding.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...1/2agi6x-1.jpg

Having a fork lift really saves the back at times like these.

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Once sanded out, it is time for more primer. Then it gets blocked out again. And finally one more light coat of primer and final wet sanding with 600 grit. Wiping down with solvent and checking reflections in the wet surface tells me what it will look like with shiny paint. Perfection is the elusive goal.

Wet with solvent and looking ready for paint.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2v81rx3-1.jpg

Hinge parts are ready too.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...1/aym6vm-1.jpg

Then it is into the paint room for the color coat. This is always a challenge as Murphy's law is the order of the day. Precautions like a good paint room cleaning, air filter change, proper paint mixing and filtering, spray gun service, and lint free coveralls minimize the chance of Murphy showing up. With a little luck and not screwing up, the paint turns out nice.

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This week I will pick up the nickel plated parts from the plater. The safe project will then be at a stand still until I get the computer corrected art work from my tracings of the original artwork back from the graphics gal. Once I receive them I can put on the gold leaf stripes and lettering which is the fun part of the project. There are still many hours to go until completion.

Here are the parts with their new nickel plating. It is always fun unwrapping the parts and seeing the new finish.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../15h039t-1.jpg

Unfortunately, the plating budget is being blown to smithereens. :=(: And there are a few more parts to do. One is the door face plate which is a complicated piece to do. When I picked up these parts I discussed options with the plater. I think I have come up with a plan to restore it to original. Hope so, or it will be an expensive mistake.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../2gudxjc-1.jpg

We also discussed the inner door plate that surrounds the lock and time lock. It is copper plated with a black oxide finish that is polished away in swirls. I will have some test pieces plated in copper to do some tests on before tackling the original.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...2/jqni94-1.jpg

Hopefully the artwork will be done soon, until then, the project is stalled.

Nice! I was down at Matt Lamborn's shop yesterday and we were discussing the possibility of redoing the acid etched parts found on some these cannonballs. I have only tried acid etching once and that was on an axe head, but I think redoing these plates is a feasible project. Now if I only had the space, time and energy to experiment.

When I picked up the parts from the plater, two pieces had issues and they were not willing to plate them unless I would accept pits in the finished nickel plating. The two large door pivot finials (which are also nuts for adjusting the door height) had flaws in the cast material that would require repair before plating. The problem with cast is that these flaws are usually impurities within the cast and if you try to repair without getting all of the impurities out they will keep contaminating the repair and result in a pit in the plating. Sometimes if one tries to drill/grind out the flaw it can become worse underneath. For this reason they would not attempt repairs on these items. Sometimes plating extra layers of copper and then polishing the piece out can overcome the pits but it becomes a very labor intense procedure with no guarantee of the results. This shop does extensive automotive trim restoration so their standard procedure is to solder the needed repairs.

The two finials acid stripped and polished out exposing the casting flaws.

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I brought the parts home unplated to search for a solution. After a number of inquiries with no definite answer, I contacted Paul's Chrome in Pennsylvania. They are regarded by some as one of the best in the country and after sending pictures of the parts they assured me they could handle the job. They were well aware of the issues that can come up trying to repair contaminated cast and use a different process to deal with them. Instead of repairing the flaw they copper plate the piece and then lead the resulting pit. After polishing out the repair it is copper plated again, polished, nickel plated and final polished.

The results speak for themselves, two perfect door pivot finials.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images...2/acxtmh-1.jpg

I have to commend Paul's, they squeezed the parts into production and returned them in record time. :(y):

In the mean time two pieces of sheet metal have been copper and nickel plated for testing procedures for the door covers mentioned in an earlier post. I hope to start on that tomorrow.

I also made a spacer washer for the bottom door pivot finial. This safe only has a spacer under the top finial as it carries the weight of the door. I wanted to add one to the bottom finial so that when the finial is tightened to align the inner carriage into the tracks in the door cover it won't damage the paint on the door cradle or risk chipping the filler. The spacer was turned from a scrap piece of 2.5" shaft, made in the same shape as the top but thinner as the bottom pivot bolt is shorter then the top one.

Although I have a lot to learn, my machining skills are improving.

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https://www.antique-locks.com/images...2/ncldug-1.jpg

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They will be plated with the door cover once the cover's graphics are finalized. I am still waiting on graphics so that I can start the gold leaf process. The National safe project drags on...

Great stuff as always, your obsession for perfection is still making me dizzy.

With the flaws in the finials I would have given them a proper bath in battery (mild sulphuric)acid, and once thoroughly rinsed clean and dry, fluxed and caulked them with a heavy high melt soft solder like LM15 or Comsol, I've yet to have a failure of LM15 to 'take' to any filling repair, although this is of course only replicating what they have done using Lead. You could remove any really nasty bits first with the die grinder but they didn't look too bad from the pics.

I've also used low melt Tin/Bismuth alloys to good effect on casting flaws in brass, but I learned long ago from getting stuff nickel and gold plated to go entirely by what the Plater's say, as they always know what's what.

They have done a superb job on them, far better than when it left the factory. Do you keep a running tab of what all these safes cost you or is it irrelevant and purely for the love of doing it?

BTW, from the pics it looks like you bored the washer out to size with the round boring bar, and then used it to side turn to outside diameter and face it off, naughty boy :-O

Good catch Huw. The carbide boring bar was oh so sharp and it cut such a nice finish that I couldn't resist. Being ignorant has it's advantages. With the quick change compound angle tool post it was just to easy to change the angle and continue on. The digital readout is also invaluable.

Ah, I see, that was the little catch though, the big one is what looks like a round boring bar clamped in an ordinary square holder! If it's round shank it should be a snug fit in a block holder bored to suit the round shank, as the contact area is minimal when you clamp a round profile down onto a flat surface.

As you found it did work fine, as boring the thin washer needs only a very small amount of overhang of the bar. If you tried the same setup with the bar projecting 3 or 4 inches to bore out a sleeve or collar, I guarantee it'd chatter your teeth and eyeballs out! Like using a big coil spring as a hammer!

FWIW you can get all manner of HSS and brazed carbide sizes with square shanks to fit ordinary square holders.
Attachment 19050

Whereas the fancy indexable-bit round shank bars are intended for mounting in block holders like this homemade job.

Attachment 19051 Attachment 19052

They are easy to make from square stock, and if bored oversize to fit your largest one make a few reduction sleeves and its even more versatile to take smaller sizes plus other tools too.

You probably know all this anyway, so apologies if I'm overstating the obvious.

BTW Vibration is never far away when boring deep holes, the big bars used in industry usually have an adjustable tensioned core so they can actually be 'tuned' to the job as it progresses, to minimise/eliminate vibration and maintain fine surface finish- full of useless info me...apologies for the wander OT.

I don't mind getting a little off topic. The lock/safe forums have been pretty slow so any chatter is good chatter. (pun intended)

The modern tooling is getting more and more versatile. While the tool holder is designed for square tooling it also has a small v in the bottom to support round stock. The boring bar which is made of carbide and has a replaceable carbide bit is extremely rigid. It also has a flat surface on the top to aid in mounting and to keep the cutting angle secure. It is a pricey chunk of metal and I probably wouldn't lay out the cash for it but it came with the lathe/mill combo when I bought it. The previous owner had spent a lot of money on tooling.

There is something to be said for good old HSS tooling. I just was gifted a large selection of HSS tooling from my uncle. When he bought his lathe many moons ago from a 40 year Westinghouse tool and die maker, he got tool boxes full of HHS (small amount of carbide) stock and specially ground bits. At 89, he is passing some on to me. I will cherish them.

I do need to improve my sharpening techniques and equipment though.

Huw, I wish you were a neighbor. I could learn a lot hanging around you. Now, if I could only solve a glitch in the CNC program...

CNC? We don't use the 'C' word in my shed :-O

When you said the digital readout was invaluable I wrongly assumed you had a manual lathe fitted with a 2 or 3-axis DRO, didn't realise you do it auto'd on the c word.
Definitely way to go for repetitive batch work and perhaps as few as say 10 or 12, but for one-off parts or a couple of different washers surely you could turn them manually by hand in a fraction of the time the programming alone would take?

C word, now that's funny.

You assumed correctly, I have been making parts manually. The DRO really shines for that. This machine was DRO and CNC equipped when I bought it. I loaded the program up on a computer and fought a few gremlins but had it operational for the mill. Before I could set up the lathe a health issue sidelined me for a period of time. That's all it took to forget most of what I had learned, so when I needed to make a part I just did it manually. Like you said, it's faster.

CNC does not make a machinist, only a machine operator. That is why the area technical collage still trains the machine tool students on manual machines for a semester. Those days are probably numbered as technology advances. I'm back at fooling around with it but am having some issues. I just might be getting to old as I sometimes deplore tech. That damn Iphone, scanning codes on the kids car, I even got tired of to much tech in the new Corvette. It is now gone and I'm going back to a 60's - 70's muscle car.

In old age I think I will concentrate on Model T's, old safes, and drinking beer. In which order is still to be determined.

Stunning work, if your beer drinking is of the same quality as your old safes, then respect is due.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Gary Stephenson

Stunning work, if your beer drinking is of the same quality as your old safes, then respect is due.

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+1, I'm still a little way off old age, but reverse the order to beer, then old safes and Model Ts and I'm in anyway.

It's interesting you mentioned about CNC makes an operator and not a machinist. I couldn't agree more, from discussions on engineering forums over here it's already showing problems this side of the pond, at least your tech colleges are still training on manual machines.
Apparently it's getting common for youngsters working in CNC over here to scratch their heads when something goes pear shaped in the CNC machine, everything on shut down as they haven't a clue what's happening between the machine, the tools, or the interaction with the metal/workpiece etc.

It's like any hands-on skill the operator needs a feel for what's going on. Manual turning, milling, cutting threads etc, in some ways are little different to hand making a detector lock key, picking open a good cylinder lock or drilling open a bankers safe.

Unless the subject can experience each of the different processes and what they can throw at you, and at all of the different stages of doing them, and, (crucially) develop that instinctive 'feel' for what's happening at every stage, including when things aren't right, then there's little point as they won't end up much good at doing any of them.
With more and more tech and electronics coming in and new systems like 3-D printing rapidly gaining ground it has to make one think where it's all heading.

Anyway, hope you get back on your feet and good luck with those c word gremlins :-)

The National safe project has been on the back burner for the most part. I finally got some of the simpler artwork along with the lettering so I will start some gold leaf in a few days. I also have been experimenting with the artwork on the plated pieces. With sample pieces plated in copper and nickel, a number of trial and error processes were tried.

The inner door cover and the inner compartment door are copper plated, darkened, and have polished swirls. Copper is relatively easy to work with but it still took a number of tries to get the results I was satisfied with. This is the result I plan to go with.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../15692x5-1.jpg

The nickel plated front cover was more difficult. Nickel is naturally more resistant to chemicals (especially when polished) so finding the correct chemicals to use is critical. It was hard to find information online and no one seemed to know what would work. Finally, I hit pay dirt when I called Jax Chemical Company in Mount Vernon, New York. There, a knowledgeable representative spent a good amount of time with me discussing what chemicals may give the results I needed. He also shared possible procedures that he knew other customers used for restorations.

It took a number of tries but I came up with a process that gives repeatable results. I also had to try several types of mask to create a design. This is the result I plan to use. It is just a hand cut pattern that is similar to the original to prove the process. I was pleased how well the edge of the mask held up and how sharp the edges of the lines are. In fact, they show every flaw of my hand cutting with an Exacto knife. With a computer cut mask it should duplicate the original design as close as possible.

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../1zqr7lh-1.jpg

https://www.antique-locks.com/images.../264jc7q-1.jpg

The original. I will go into more details once the pieces are done successfully.

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This National safe has been a drawn out project with waiting for third party suppliers to get their part done. The main holdup was the small sign shop that digitizes the artwork from my tracings. Once my stuff got moved to the abyss of the “someday” counter I knew I was in trouble. Despite extra time spent perfecting my beer consumption this winter, some progress has been made. (on the safe that is)

I was getting pissed off in January so I pulled the artwork for the front door cover (the most difficult piece) and searched for someone else to do it. I ran an ad on Craigslist and found an underemployed graphic artist who was eager to make some extra cash. I had the finished artwork back in less than a week. I then dropped off the digital file off at another sign shop that had the type of mask I needed to use to be cut. Two weeks later I finally had the finished mask.

Now I was confident the pattern on the original piece could be destroyed so off the cover went to be plated. At the plating shop they told me the spring car parts rush had started early and they were booking three plus months out, oh boy, here we go again. I was pleased to get a package in 6 weeks with parts but when I opened it I found that the cover was in copper instead of nickel. The cover was pitted and it took a lot of buffing to get the metal smooth. Knowing that this was an important piece on the safe and I was very anal about it, Steve wanted approval of the copper base before nickel plating it. It was good and I had it back in four days.

I guess I neglected to take a picture of it in the fresh nickel so we will move on to returning it to the original design. First the heavy vinyl mask is put on. It is cut with extra material to wrap around the edges. The back is sealed off with more vinyl to prevent an unwanted leak. Now comes the hard part. With the artwork and plating costs this is now a $430 part, and it now has to go into the blast cabinet to etch the pattern into the nickel. No margin for error now. The unprotected surface is blasted with fresh 120 grit aluminum oxide at a low 60 lbs of air pressure with the gun about 10” away. The blast has to be at 90° to prevent lifting the mask and yet you have to get the surface etched well at the edges of the mask. Here it is after blasting, the mask is white.

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Once verifying the blast is even, the residual dust and grit is gently dusted off with a soft brush. Any scratch or defect may show up in the final finish. I robbed one of the wife’s Tupperware storage containers that was the perfect size for dipping the cover in a mixture of selenious acid, nitric acid, and copper sulfate. A tubeless tire plug/patch made the perfect handle for lifting it out of the acid.

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Once flooded with the acid it only takes about 45 seconds to darken the nickel. Once removed from the acid the part is rinsed with purified water, excess water blotted off, and dried with a heat gun to prevent any water spots in the finish.

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The final product. A nearly exact match to the original hand drawn design.

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The inner door was copper plated and had a similar finish though it was well worn off.

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Often called a Japanned finish, the copper is treated with selenious acid. With a simple design to duplicate, I was able to hand cut the mask in vinyl. In tests the highly polished copper darkened well but when this part was dipped it took on an uneven finish. After the panic mode resided I gave the finish a light blast and then it took on an even finish.

The fresh copper finish.

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Mask applied.

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Finished. It is not symmetrical just like the original.

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I did not have the door back cover plated yet as it fits very tight around the lock and time lock and new plating may cause it to not fit. This cover was in pretty good shape so I thought I might be able to salvage it with dipping it in acid to refresh the dark finish. I polished the bright swirls and then masked them off. I noticed that when I pulled the tape off from polishing some copper had lifted. When I gave the copper a very gentle blast at 20 psi it removed large areas of the copper from the steel. The copper was just flash plated and had poor adhesion.

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Oh well, win some – lose some. Once the door is fully assembled the cover will be fitted, relieved to allow for plating, plated, and then refinished. I doubt I would have been satisfied with the reworked original anyway.

The corrected artwork dribbled in over the winter. First to get done was the simple top, sides, and lettering. Often, I would just mask out the stripes with tape for the gold leaf. On this National there are two very thin (1/32") pinstripes inside of the gold leaf stripes. These would be tough to do by hand so I had a mask cut so I could do them all at once. Also, the gold stripes are not outlined on the sides and top of this National safe so clean straight edges are the order of the day. Measurements from the original were used to position the mask and it was taped in place. Then several pieces of masking tape are put across the center. The top half is folded down and the backing is peeled back and trimmed off. The top is put back in place and squeegeed out.

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Then the tape is removed and the backing is removed from the bottom half and it is squeegeed out.

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Now the white carrier mask is removed leaving the mask in place. There are a number of mask materials available, in this case an economy vinyl is used as it is very thin and the adhesive doesn't set up quickly. Being thin helps prevent a ridge of adhesive for the gold leaf developing at the edge and the weaker adhesive on the vinyl promotes easy removal if not left in place for too long. Here it is ready for the gold leaf.

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Once the size (varnish based adhesive) is brushed on and allowed to dry to the proper tack, the gold is applied and brushed into place. Once brushed in and all the waste loose gold is cleaned up the pinstripes are painted with 1shot black sign paint with a pinstripe brush. At this point it won't win any beauty awards. You can see the gold has also been put on the mask for the lettering on the base of the safe.

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After some dwell time the mask is carefully removed to leave the stripes and lettering with nice sharp edge lines. Certainly updated from the original.

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Under certain lighting the 23 karat gold really pops!

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As March rolled around I was getting really pissed off and started hounding the gal at the sign shop to get the artwork done. I sent her numerous texts every week just to be a pain. Finally she said that she had the front of the safe done but was having problems getting the hinge to match my tracing. I went into the shop to assist and found she had used only the center design of the scan of the tracing and was trying to build the top and bottom manually on the computer. She assumed the hinge was circular like the door opening when it is oblong and it was throwing the whole thing off. I rescanned the tracing of the top of the hinge on her scanner and had her attach it to the corrected center and with a few adjustments it was good to go. This was all done in Adobe Illustrator. Then she copied the top to the bottom and with a few more adjustments and measurement confirmations it was done. Just over an hour. I waited 5 months for this?

I was happy to get the last of the artwork home and cranked up the heat and got started. Here is the hinge mask applied.

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Here the front mask is positioned ready to be applied. The stripes wrap around the curves in the corners which took some finesse to get it to work out.

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Once the front of the safe was gold leafed, I could position the name of the bank centered between the front and top stripes. I had this mask for several months but could not use it until the front was done.

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It is always fun to apply the gold leaf. Initially when applied it looks like one will have a disaster in the making.

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Now the gold is done. While it looks nice it is still not finished.

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Now it is time for the lettering to be outlined in black and the stripes in red. A few other stripes and finishing touches and the artwork is done.

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It is always fun to put together newly painted and plated parts but it is also tedious as you don’t want to scratch anything. Working slow, thinking before doing anything and using lots of masking tape to protect fragile surfaces becomes standard procedure.
First the hinge was put back on the body. I was nervous about this step but the bolts fit in the hinge pockets very tightly so they had to go back to the same position that they were in originally. The hinge is not adjustable.

First the hinge parts are prepared and the lower bearing assembled. There is that extra spacer that was made on the lathe.

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The hinge is fit.

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All bolts and shiny parts get taped to protect the new nickel plating. Plated washers were added to prevent the bolt heads from scoring the paint.

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Next came mounting the hinge to the door that has been in the body for many months. The door is supported on two carriages (four wheels on each one) that the door pivot bolts pass through. The carriage wheels track in grooves in the door. The door cover bolts to the carriages to lock it all together as one unit. It took a number of installs to get things right. The door pivot bolts not only adjust vertically by turning the large polished finials, they are also adjusted in/out and left/right by four adjuster bolts on the top and bottom of the door end of the hinge. It’s a very complicated adjusting procedure. I struggled to get the door to fit well but after many tries all of a sudden I hit the magic combination and the door fit the opening perfectly. Once all bolt adjustments are noted, it comes apart one more time to grease and oil all surfaces.

The door carriages, the dial cup and ring are also installed in this picture.

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Trial door fitting.

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Once the door fits the hole the next challenge is adjusting the door lug ring and inner lug ring that control the position of the door rotating as well as the wedging of the door in the taper of the opening. Ideally, the door wedges tight just as the rotation hits the stop where the locking bolts can be thrown out into the slots in the inner ring. This will make the door seam impenetrable to nitroglycerine attacks. I set the door tolerances loose so as to reduce strain on the door drive system. No reason to protect against nitro in this over regulated day and age. When I disassembled the lug ring it was shimmed about .035 with cut up 1906 time cards from the National factory. I shimmed with .046 (uncompressed) gasket material which gave the perfect clearance. The door closes and rotates so nicely I don’t think KY jelly could assist. This whole door fitting process took the better part of two days.

Gaskets on the lug ring.

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The inner lug ring, inner compartment spacer, and shelf must be fitted as a unit. There is no joy in working with these heavy parts inside a safe!

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Once the internal fitting is done the shelf is completed, the original carpets are installed and the compartment door.

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After the door was fitted, final assembly of the lock, time lock, and associated door linkage was next on the list. The lock is a Yale 65 ½ fiction fence model. It differs from most fiction fence locks in that it has a full back cover vs. a wheel pack hole and the friction fence is not a sealed assembly. Instead it is separate pieces and has a brass washer under the pivot bolt head to retain the springs. This lock has a lot of wear in it from a lot of use and the fact that the lock directly moves all the door internal linkage and inner door locking bolts. The internal flat springs were missing inside the friction fence so an external wound spring was added to replace them which added extra drag and wear on the wheel pack drive wheel.

Inside the 65 ½ Yale lock.

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I wondered how I could repair the friction fence and what I could use for springs. While measuring clearance on the door lug ring the feeler gauge in my hand provided the answer. The high carbon feeler gauge shims are similar to spring steel. After measuring inner and outer diameters and the grooves in the fence I calculated .006 would be the correct thickness. I cut two strips and assembled the fence only to find it rotated a bit stiff. Dropping to .004 gave about the right feel but one of the strips could slip out of the groove on one end where the hole of the fence was worn. I switched to a .006 strip on that side after ever so slightly filing the groove. Now the fence had good rotational friction and the springs stayed in place. I hope Doug approves of this repair.

Grooves inside the fence.

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Fitting new strips.

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Wear inside the lock also allowed the lock bolt to side out to far if the dial was turned forcefully to extend the bolt to lock the safe. If that happened, the friction fence would jam against the outer edge of the drive wheel gate preventing it to pull into the wheel pack gates. This would cause a lockout. To prevent the bolt from extending to far it was jigged into the mill and a hole was drilled into the end of the lock bolt. After threading the hole a socket cap screw was machined to the proper clearance to contact the outer ring of the door.

Drilling the lock bolt.

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New lock bolt stopper in place.

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Here is a video of dialing action inside the lock so you can see how a friction fence works. Also shown is the simple pivoting lock operated by the time lock to prevent the retracting of the lock bolt. And finally, all the inner door linkage that must be moved by the dial to activate the internal door bolts. My sloppy dialing is accompanied by ZZ Top.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGrz01SA1WE


The door is now complete other than the rear door cover. It has been fitted and sent out for new copper plating. The twelve ¾ inch bolts that hold the lug ring to the door still need to be replated but I have to repair some damage to five of them. Other than that, the National Manganese Steel Money Chest is finished. Drum roll please.

In all her glory…

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Spectacular work! And thanks for all the pictures and work through descriptions.

Very Cool Nice Job Work. To bad as don't find a lot of people like you can do the job on that safe....Timothy...