I understand the desire for a strong lock, but at what point is too much simplicity sacrificed for the sake of strength?
As Cliff pointed out, I feel the big step up for these locks is reliability, specifically the ability to avoid unwanted disengagements of the lock. I realize the lock makers are crowing about the strength of their new locks, but the ability to avoid disengagements is a top priority, and the new locks seem to be good at this. Strength is important too, and these new locks all have that in abundance. Long-term resistance to breaking down is also important, and as you point out these new locks sometimes have a few more small parts. On the other hand, although it hasn't been long enough to draw har conclusions, so far we haven't seen real problems here beyond a few hiccups when the rolling lock was released.
I think that the liner lock's reputation for poor reliability may be due more to badly made liner locks than to any problems with the liner lock itself. Has anyone ever had failure with a liner lock made by a quality maker like Kit Carson or A.T. Barr?
There is definitely a range of quality of liner locks, from terrible to very reliable. But the problem here is, for every really great liner lock maker, I can probably name you at least five who stink. If this lock is so difficult to make reliable that very few people can do it, then it should be recognized as a specialty lock and not a great general-lock solution.
It seems like all the bad reports I hear are from factory folders; maybe the Rolling Lock and Axis lock are better suited to mass production than the liner lock. I still think that a well made liner lock might be a better overall lock, but maybe it takes a custom maker to really make it perform, whereas the Rolling Lock or Axis lock lend themselves better to mass production.
Ryan, this is a really mistaken notion that your fingers might pay dearly for someday. You hear more about production liner locks because there's more of them out there, but IN GENERAL my experience is that custom makers are absolutely no better, and may be worse, than the good production companies. Now let me rush to say that there are some custom makers whose liner locks are unmatched. But there are a lot of custom makers out there doing unreliable liner locks. Furthermore, high cost and a big name provide little guidance -- some of the big name guys barely seem to QA their liner locks at all! On the other hand, there are some custom makers whose liner locks are consistently rock solid.
Which brings me around to the main point again. A lock format which everyone uses, but only a minority can actually get to work in a reliable fashion, is a lock format I don't want in general production. I'll buy an A.T. Barr liner lock any day -- but there's a whole lotta guys and production companies who I'm glad to see are looking at other lock types.
All these comments are aimed at liner locks, BTW. The integral lock does not seem to have the liner lock's problems, are at least nowhere near to the same extent, so for qualitative purposes I consider it a different kind of lock. The fact that your hand reinforces the lock-up on an integral lock, instead of possibly interfering with it, really changes the reliability story.
Joe
