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  1. #1
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Posts
    24
    Country: United States

    Default York Ely-Norris cannonball safe with pie timelock

    Just wanted to share some pictures of my 'new' Ely-Norris cannonball safe. I have extaracted it from a banks vault in nothern Iowa. The name of the bank is on the safe. Everything is original and complete, all the timelock keys are there. Timelock functions great. Finish is very well preserved. However, from temperature/humidity fluctuations in the vault, the finish underlayer got loose, causing the paint to crack, 'breathe' and chip off easily. To remedy this problem I've sprayed several coats of Krylon triple-thick glaze. This helped a lot -- finish now stays put, but not sure for how long. Because the safe is so nicely preserved overall, I was thinking of not refinishing it. Instead I would like to patch up the areas where the finish is gone. Any pointers here? One guy told me that a color-matched epoxy might do the trick.

    Also, any kind of info about this type of safe will be highly appreciated. Like an old catalog, maybe? What might be a value of such safe in the condition shown? The safe is ~45 inches high, weights ~3,000 lbs. I saw this timelock alone going for ~$1000 on eBay not long ago...

    Thanks again.


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  2. #2
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Posts
    24
    Country: United States

    Default Re: York Ely-Norris cannonball safe with pie timelock

    More pictures...


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  3. #3
    Join Date
    Aug 2004
    Location
    Cyberspace
    Posts
    1,318
    Country: Australia

    Default Re: York Ely-Norris cannonball safe with pie timelock

    Another fine safe !

    The timelocks do make good money, although they are not as scarce as the pin dial on your other safe still a very nice lock to have.

    A point just FYI should anyone ever be offered one of these that is 'locked'. The actual main security of this design is solely in the timelock. The combination lock is only a 'day lock' and can be defeated quite easily. So as long as the timelock is open / the door not rusted shut this model is not hard to open.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    May 2008
    Posts
    24
    Country: United States

    Default Re: York Ely-Norris cannonball safe with pie timelock

    Thank you very much for your input, oldlock. That's good to know, about the locked cannonballs.

    I am keeping my eyes open for a Corliss, but heard even the smalest ones are still big and increadibly heavy... Plus most of them are on the east coast, as they were produced in Rhode Island. Heard of only one spoted here, in Midwest.

    Vlad

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Aug 2004
    Location
    Cyberspace
    Posts
    1,318
    Country: Australia

    Default Re: York Ely-Norris cannonball safe with pie timelock

    Just to clarify - it's only this model, with this particular timelock configuration that has this issue when opening ..

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Posts
    1,485
    Country: United States

    Default

    Some time ago I found this image of an advertisement for Ely-Norris safes inside York safes. It is supposedly from 1918 and shows the working relationship that Ely-Norris had with York at the time. What I also find interesting is that the ad mis-spells the name of the company, at the bottom, as "Eli-Norris".

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    The image is from http://www.officemuseum.com/filing_equipment_safes.htm and in particular http://www.officemuseum.com/1918_Yor...Co_York_PA.jpg.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Mar 2015
    Posts
    2
    Country: United States

    Default

    I have this same safe. It's open but the dial is too stiff to turn. I need to remove the dial and face plate. Does anyone have any good ideas?

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Nov 2015
    Posts
    6
    Country: United States

    Default

    Great safe...and thank you for posting the pictures of the original striping. Here is an Ely-Norris I restored a while back. Doug did the time lock work on it.

    Matt
    Nahum 1:7
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails FB_IMG_1446867436540.jpg   FB_IMG_1446867427907.jpg  

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Nov 2015
    Posts
    6
    Country: United States

    Default

    These were called "fire jacketed" cannonball safes...here is a photo of Mosler's version of one I recently restored.

    Matt
    Nahum 1:7

    Quote Originally Posted by wylk View Post
    Some time ago I found this image of an advertisement for Ely-Norris safes inside York safes. It is supposedly from 1918 and shows the working relationship that Ely-Norris had with York at the time. What I also find interesting is that the ad mis-spells the name of the company, at the bottom, as "Eli-Norris".

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    The image is from http://www.officemuseum.com/filing_equipment_safes.htm and in particular http://www.officemuseum.com/1918_Yor...Co_York_PA.jpg.
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  10. #10
    Join Date
    Jan 2016
    Location
    Austin, Texas
    Posts
    30
    Country: United States

    Default Ely Norris cannonball safe

    I just purchased and now have an Ely Norris cannonball safe. It has Yale? triple timelocks and Yale dual combination lock on the outside of the door.

    I know nothing about how to go about cleaning the safe up to repaint it. The timelock works and I have a change key to reset combinations for the outside locks that are set on "50".

    Could anyone give me some pointer on restoring a cannonball? Can I take the door off to get the body sandblasted or beadblasted? Or at least take out the timelock so it does not get broken? Is that difficult?

    Thanks

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