Hello everyone,
Bit of drama yesterday to follow a bit of a flare up on my outsides …
So I get home … and the key turns in the lock. Which is kinda what you want a key to do. Except you want it to open the latch to let you open the door. Oh well. It just turned in the lock. It let me in eventually but I took it as a sign that I needed to do something urgently. (You can get past a latch lock by means I won’t put here but it doesn’t want to become your door key).
Of course I took it apart after doing a little investigation. And changing the lock and latch over to a new one :-D.
It just came apart in my hands. Honest. Well, actually it kinda exploded while I was trying to remove the broken bit and parts were propelled out of my hands by the spring there. So … what’s the bits ? It’s a pretty standard night latch lock, you may have one of these on at least one door. Reasonable security but you want a second bolt type lock as well. These can be bypassed with the right implement.
Top left is the main assembly. You can just see the lever that’s on the inside of the door. That works on the greasy clip thing on the left, which has a couple of arms that engage on the plate with the latch on it. That’s the silvery thing inside that assembly. The latch wedge is hidden to the right of the assembly. The deadlock fits in to the little notch on the top of that silver latch plate. If the deadlock is engaged, the latch stays put.
The black plate to the right is the back plate and in theory, it holds it all in place. The latch plate isn’t held in by anything else and if it lifts, the arms on the rotatey arm don’t engage and move it open. On the right side of the latch plate is a circular pin thing with a couple of cut outs in it.
Bottom left and we have a circular washer type thing with a couple of triangular inserts on the inside and a couple of arms on the outside. The arms withdraw the latch plate and open the door. The inserts engage on the lock key barrel. The spring is to the bottom right and it pulls the latch out.
So … apply force on the inner handle or the outside lock, latch slides in, door opens. Release force, spring pulls out the latch, door won’t open.
However, if the circly prongy washer falls off, it will a) not let you open the door with the key and … b) will jam the lock if it goes in the wrong place.
So I now have a new lock for the front door. The last one did well, that’s probably a 30 year old lock there although I had to replace the original barrel because it rusted solid.
Oops.
One thing I’ve been appreciating about Red actually is its door locks and automatic folding mirrors. I’ve had folding mirrors on the other Lexii since I think my first IS but none of them folded the doors in when you locked the car. It’s actually a really nice feature but not for the mirrors … It’s a very easy way to check if you locked the doors :-D. Yep, there’s the indication thingy on the inner handle but you can’t see that from 20 feet away from the car.
It’s the little things. Or the things big enough to see from a distance.
Other news before I close up ? After enjoying reading the intriguing Forgotten Colony : Deliverance by M R Forbes (aliens have infested Earth, we gotta escape, intense combat action from start to finish), I’ve been cracking up to Clockwork Boys by T.Kingfisher (Amazon link). It’s in a swords and armour fantasy world where our people live in a city state threatened by unstoppable, invincible constructions known as the Clockwork Boys. Our people have to travel to their source and figure out how to stop them.
It is, of course, a suicide mission. They’re unstoppable creations that crush armies. But they’ll be eaten by a semi sentient tattoo if they don’t. Yep. After a bit of time to let the characters settle in, the author (aka Ursula Vernon) is letting us have some fun reading their antics. Another recommended one after the wonderful A Wizard’s Guide To Defensive Baking and I need to collect and read more of her books.
Might be time to get back to that after maybe a little Motorsport Manager with dinner. There’s a new Formula 1 Manager game out but to be honest, they haven’t added enough and if they follow their form, they’ll abandon this one in November to concentrate on next year’s iteration. I’ll wait for the last one in the run.
Yeah, that was pretty much me last weekend. After finishing Dredge, last weekend’s game was One Military Camp. Another fairly new one. It’s a decent game but … maybe could have done with a little more time in the oven. Worth checking out though.
But I was hiding in the game mostly to stop me damaging myself even more. I’d been in the position where a flare up started on my arms and legs, worse than it has been previously. It got bad enough that I actually medicated it, which is something I try and avoid. The topical steroids are a quick hit to help but I think they actually extend the healing time.
Anyway, being lost in the game meant I wasn’t attacking my arms and legs, giving them a chance to heal a bit. (May have been some Skyrim played too).
Things have settled down a bit although I’m still not good yet. Getting there though. Dinner’s nearly ready so I’ll leave it there except for … Someone reminded me about the Kitten Marching Band.
Here you go. At the Youtube link lies a guaranteed dose of Happy. I bear no responsibility if you end up humming that for days. 😀