Tiny Tuesday: Window Lock

After a couple of busy weeks without much time for progress on the 3rd (and last!) of the old sash windows we're renovating at the moment, we're now back to work on them again.

This prompted me to take the central shot in this collage as my Tiny Tuesday blip for today. It's a tiny screw stud which acts as the key-operated lock on some new sash latches which I've bought. (Insurers do like any accessible window to have a key-operated lock.)

The two upper shots show how it works: when it's closed (top left photo), you screw the stud down into a little hole in the baseplate: in the top right shot you can see it open with the key in the stud, and you can see the hole into which the stud screws down when it's closed, to lock it. It's a beautifully simple, neat modification to the latch.

I was delighted to find these on sale as I feel they're much better than the older style of key lock for sash windows, shown in the lower two photos. Those locks are completely independent of the latch, and rely on a screw rod which goes through holes in both sashes to lock them to each other to prevent opening. I've always found it difficult to instal them neatly, and getting the rod to go accurately through into the second sash often requires a lot of jiggling to get the sashes accurately aligned.

Many thanks to JDO who is nobly hosting TT for a further week - thanks Jill!