thank you and yes

Is there anywhere to order these Bogota Rakes?

send raimundo a pm. he'll hook you up.

Awesome, great resource, thanks!

thanks for the info. fyi you can now order them from serepick.com

I tried making a small bogota pick from a wiper blade insert (the 2mm wide kind) and failed miserably. :cry: I ended up with something that looked like a really long snake rake. I guess it wasn't a complete failure because I was still able to open up a kwikset and some wafer locks with it. It doesn't work as well as another rake I made though that was a little larger, but if it works it works. Sometimes I'll use it one way and then flip it over and use it the other way to get those stubborn pins or wafers. I'm jealous, I wish I had Raimundo's awesome bogota pick making abilities. I apologize early for the horribly blurry picture. No I don't put handles on my thin little homemade picks. I kind of like how the don't get in the way and how I can see into the keyway if I want to.

Here is my pick failure: You can see that the grooves are too far apart and form rounded humps instead of peaks like they should



P.S. The thin inserts work great as tension wrenches, especially sensitive ones if you like to apply too much pressure use a longer handle and one that goes deep inside the lock so it won't fall out and just place a light amount of pressure on it at the tip with your finger, even enough to see it flex works great. They also work wonderfully on padlocks because you can use your thumb of the hand holding the lock to apply pressure, but I digress because this is not the subject of this post.

Well, I finally got around to making a Bogota, and I have to say I'm seriously impressed with the results!

This cuts my time in half with nearly every lock I own. Serious props to raimundo for the design and many many thanks to him for sharing these documents with the community.

Remember, folks, if it ain't workin', you should probably polish it more and bounce your tension wrench a little.

Hi, I've been interested in making some bogota's for a while now but have had very little luck in finding usable street sweeper bristle. I have found a couple bristles in the gutter that I've kept but they're covered in rust.

After inspecting them, the rust seems entirely topical. What I'm wondering is, would the bristle still be fine if I just buffed the rust off with sandpaper, or would this compromise the strength of the steel in some way?

if you sand it until it shines again it should be fine. the better you sand and polish it, the more resistant it will be from rust.

reddish rust is usually new and comes off best with scotchbrite pads. dark brown rust is deep and thick and after this kind of rust is removed there are likly to be pits in the metal that you should plan to avoid with the pickshaft, and tip, but they are not a problem on the handles.

take rust off with a rough type of scotchbrite and inspect the surface for pits and deep scratches, then cut away the bad parts. Bogotas can be made with about three or three and a half inch pieces, whatever else you make you can decide how to put the handles on.

Thanks for the quick replies. I'll give it a go with the scotchbrite and see what they look like afterwords.