With no wick to keep lit, the wheel lock is easier to use, and more reliable than the matchlock. However, wheel locks are expensive to produce. Matchlocks, at half the cost, remain in common use.

Although matchlock pistols had existed, the wheel lock made pistols far more practical and common. Paul Lockhart, Firepower: How Weapons Shaped Warfare 80 (2021).

Not only do you need firearms technology, you also had to know how to build a clock, all in the lock of a gun." Even with the rise of the flintlock action in the 1600s, the wheellock still held ...

Last week I wrote about two of the earliest muzzleloading blackpowder firearms used in the colonies — the matchlock and the wheel lock — and the fun of firing the Skip to main ...

1509 - Invention of wheel lock (rose lock). The next major advance, the wheel lock, generates a spark mechanically. With no wick to keep lit, the wheel lock is easier to use, and more reliable than ...