Detent ball on liner lock

[butcher_block]

all good tips i too use the washer to set the detent hight
i also blue the tang and let the ball mark the blade then spot with a carbide ball end mill
who else uses a carbid 4 flute bit to drill the pivot to size and skip a reamer ?

 

[kuraki]

I've had bad luck with endmills going oversize when plunge cutting.

 

[Geoff Flato]

I understand why people do it. It just doesn't seem very precise to me.....a lot of guess work. I remember the book saying to locate the detent hole in the blade .020" past the track the bearing scratches on the blade. That could go sideways pretty quick and if you're very far off, the ball bearing won't fall in the hole at all.

Just seems more sure fire to close the knife firmly with the stop pin in and drill through the lock bar and blade at once.

Drilling in one shot is how I learned it as well. I handled 20-30 of Franks liner locks when I visited him last summer, and the opening and closing on every one was flawless.
Both ways work, the main thing is making sure the knife functions as a whole regardless of what approach is uses to make it, and knowing how to tune up and correct issues on the finished knife.