Lets ID this cannonball safe.

[00247]

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

[00247]

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.



Naked and proud. Just like Charlie Rose.



Door hinge casting has a lot of flaws.



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



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.





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.



Wet sanding.



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



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.



Hinge parts are ready too.



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.







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.

[00247]

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



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.



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.



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

[Gary Stephenson]

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

[Huw Eastwood]

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

+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 :-)

[00247]

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.



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.





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

[00247]

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.



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.



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.





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



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



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.



Mask applied.



Finished. It is not symmetrical just like the original.



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.





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.

[00247]

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.



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



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.



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.



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.





Under certain lighting the 23 karat gold really pops!





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.



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.



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.



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



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




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.