Outline And Review: Foley-Belsaw Locksmithing Course

[honesthans]

JimB wrote:

So I took the FB course, went to work for a locksmith and had him throw me to the wolves. That's when the real education began.

I'm close to finishing the first 30 lessons of the course, and one thing that I'd really appreciate hearing about is what skills you had to work on the most, after becoming a locksmith, which weren't covered in the course? FB can't really teach car opening through correspondence, but I'd guess there must be a lot of other important, everyday skills besides that aren't really taught in the course?

[jimb]

JimB wrote:

So I took the FB course, went to work for a locksmith and had him throw me to the wolves. That's when the real education began.

I'm close to finishing the first 30 lessons of the course, and one thing that I'd really appreciate hearing about is what skills you had to work on the most, after becoming a locksmith, which weren't covered in the course? FB can't really teach car opening through correspondence, but I'd guess there must be a lot of other important, everyday skills besides that aren't really taught in the course?

First I don't think there's any everyday skills that are not covered in the course, but there are everyday skills that are taught, but not as extensively as they should be. That would be in the automotive area.

I think anything that is auto related including unlocks should have more instruction in the course. Maybe in the newer lessons there are but when I took the course they did not include any auto locks for practice. They do tell you to practice these lessons but I did not want to practice on my car and I never took the time to go to the junk yard.

So if your asking what you should work on the most after the course I would say hit the junk yard and unlock every type of car you can find and practice on some auto locksmithing.

When you first get out into the field and doing rekeys your going to start running into locks you have never seen before. You will be scratching your head trying to figure out how to get them apart. Especially the residential knob locks.

No mater how much you learn you are still going to run into things as a locksmith you haven't seen before. You just have to use a little common since most of the time.

[honesthans]

First I don't think there's any everyday skills that are not covered in the course, but there are everyday skills that are taught, but not as extensively as they should be. That would be in the automotive area.

Thank you for answering that. I've heard a lot of comments to the effect that FB "only scratches the surface", so I wasn't sure if there were whole other areas of the business that weren't touched upon or not. I assume they were probably referring to the amount of work needed to master the topics in the course as compared to what FB asks it's students to do.

There are a couple things that I was specifically wondering about, though.

I'm concerned about the fact that FB doesn't really even mention transponders in their course or that they haven't up to the point that I'm at. I just about understand what they do but was wondering if there is any real skill involved in working with them that needs to be mastered, beyond traditional techniques, or is it just a matter of having the right equipment and data for a particular model car?

Also, are there any particular lock models FB doesn't mention that someone in the field ought to know about? I hear a lot of locks mentioned on this board that I'm not really familliar with or have just never heard of before, and I think that I'd be at a total loss if I was asked to work on some of these designs. -Thanks again!

[jimb]

There are areas that are not touched upon. I just want to make sure my comment was understood. They teach the basics on what you will run into on a daily basis.

Don't expect to come out of this course thinking your going to know everything or enough that you can go out and start a locksmith business upon completion of the course. It's not going to happen. I guess you could but you better be able to figure out things on the call or your going to be dealing with lots of headaches.

Transponders are not mentioned in the course, at least not when I took it. You will find many other things in the business that were not mentioned, but you wont run into these on a daily basis.

As far as locks there's is a supplement to the course furnished by Schlage that involves many pages of detailed drawings of just their locks. The most common locks you will run into at least that I run into as far as residential are Kwikset and Schlage dead bolts and knob locks. In commercial it's mostly Mortice cylinders. Most of the time Schlage. In nine months of working I've only had 2 calls for pad locks and both were to remove the lock. One was a cheap warded lock and the other was a cheap Master Lock. We get calls to remove the disc locks from storage units but I don't run any of them.

[honesthans]

You will find many other things in the business that were not mentioned, but you wont run into these on a daily basis.

I was using the word 'everday' more as shorthand to mean important or essential skills that someone working in the field would have to know (as opposed to highly specialized skills) rather than in the literal sense as methods that a locksmith would use every or almost every working day. If I could rephrase my first question, what are the skills which FB doesn't teach which someone who wanted to work in the business would have to or really should know?

[honesthans]

-skills or methods which haven't already been mentioned in this thread?

[jimb]

I was using the word 'everday' more as shorthand to mean important or essential skills that someone working in the field would have to know (as opposed to highly specialized skills) rather than in the literal sense as methods that a locksmith would use every or almost every working day. If I could rephrase my first question, what are the skills which FB doesn't teach which someone who wanted to work in the business would have to or really should know?

I had to think about this a little, it's not something I had considered in the past. Two days a week when my boss is off I cover the phones, so I'm going to try to answer your question based on the calls I answer and calls I run. Some of these may have been taught in the FB course but they are things you need to be proficient at.

Most common calls:

1. The most common call we get is the auto lockout, we get a few house and commercial unlocks but the majority are cars.

2. In the locksmithing end the majority of the calls are to make auto keys. Most of them are non-chip keys, but we do get calls for vats and transponder keys. In the future this trend will reverse.

3. The second most received locksmith calls are to do rekeys, commercial and residential.

Less common calls:

1. Trucks, big trucks like the 18 wheelers. The freightliner is the most common, but I have run calls on Volvo and Peterbuilt. You might want to learn how to unlock these.

2. Uhaul trucks, we open quite a few of these. There's the Fords and there are the GMC's.

3. Broken locks, most of the time these are commercial locks. The customer calls and says their key just spins in circles and the door wont unlock. You need to know how to open this door as it might be the only way in. Don't ask how as it can't be discussed in the public forums.

4. Removing the Club from the steering wheel because the key is lost.

This is the majority of the calls we get and I think this will answer what you are asking. If someone wants to add to this feel free as I'm sure I'm forgetting something.

I want to add that we mention that we do safe work in our phone book ad and seldom get calls for this. There will be many other odd request including repairing work done by other locksmiths.

[jimb]

I thought of one more somewhat common request. That's to add a deadbolt lock. This means you have to put holes in the door in all the right spots.

[jimb]

You can add key extractions and tools you prefer to do them.

[hypnotist1]

I completed the course pretty fast. they do wait for your payment before the send a lesson pack. But that is SOP the lessons were simple and seemed too easy but if they were more difficllt many people would not complete the course. I have a Masters degree in education and if I were going to develop a course I would strive to make it as easy as possible therefore insuring more success. Foley Belsaw offers the basics of locksmithing.. Like anything else only practice develops the skills but having the basics allows you to continue. I do find that tools and materials for conducting a locksmithing business are rather expensive. Such as source code programs, Vehicle entering kits and precision code cutting and reading machines. these are very costly and may be a deterrant to some desiring to go into the field. I know one established locksmith that was wanting to retire had an inventory of tools, building, vehicles that he wanted to sell and he was asking well over a million dollard, That however included a storefront building .. so I suppose that tools and such are an investment. I have yet to earn any type of income from locksmithing. I diod apply for a position as a locksmith apprentis at a local university and was interviewed.. But because of my age i was passed over. They wanted someone that would be there for years to come. i would recommend Foley-Belsaw course... as a jumping off place.

[lockstone]

First off,I am happy,see the lil smiley face,I had signed up for foley belsaw last week and then found this site and read that I could have paid $599.00,so I called and they adjusted the price to $649 (because I was on a payment plan) no problem at all.I will post more later.Thanks for having this great resource.

[mattman]

First off,I am happy,see the lil smiley face,I had signed up for foley belsaw last week and then found this site and read that I could have paid $599.00,so I called and they adjusted the price to $649 (because I was on a payment plan) no problem at all.I will post more later.Thanks for having this great resource.

Hi Lockstone!

I just finished the Foley-Belsaw course last week. It seemed to be a very good course, in my opinion. I learned a lot from it. I currently work full-time at a non-locksmithing job, but am planning on opening a part-time lockout business in April.

Good luck with your studies!

-Matt

[lockstone]

Thank you matt.....I just completed lessons 1-5 last night,as others have said they were easy,lessons 6-10 will ship out next thursday.

[psehorne]

Does the Foley-Belsaw course prepare on to pass at least the ALOA ten mandatory exam categories. If not, which other distance learning provider's course does prepare one for the ALOA ten mandatory exam categories?

Thanks,
Paul

[CaptainPike]

Has anyone done the advanced foley belsaw locksmith course, or the security & fire course?

I just signed up and I'm wondering how much extra these will cost.