wheellock

A mechanism to fire an antique firearm that was the technological successor to the matchlock. It used a small arm, called a "dog", to hold a piece of pyrite that would strike down against a spinning wheel of steel to produce sparks. These sparks would ignite a pan of gunpowder that would send flames through a small hole in the barrel to ignite the powder in it.

Due to the complicated design and high cost, it never fully replaced the matchlock, and instead both match and wheellocks would be replaced by the cheaper and less complicated flintlock.

General time period of use would be the mid Renaissance era.

Examples

See also

• Firelock

External link

• Wikipedia: Wheellock