A good tip I can give is to pick up a kwikset dead bolt as they are very easy to remove and add pin stacks to. Start with the lock in a two pin configuration and get the feel of the lock then add another pin stack. Eventually you will work your way up to 5 pins. In the beginning of your practice start by trying to pin the lock with the least variation between the pins as you have in your choice of pins that the lock came pinned with. What I mean by this is try to keep pins of the same size or close to the same size grouped together so that you do not have a large variation of pin size from one pin chamber to the next. As you complete the easier pinning challenge, start to try introducing larger and larger variation of pin sizes in chambers next to each other. If we were using pin numbers to establish an easy bitting, medium bitting, and difficult bitting it would be as follows from bow to tip on the key.
Easy = 12231
Medium = 51365
Difficult = 61261
To show this in a visual manner to see pin length (this only represents pin length and does not represent the number of pins, it only represents the length of the bottom pins) it would be as follows:
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Difficult = | | | | |
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As you can see the longer pins next to shorter pins will require you to set the long pins and have the ability to set the short pins that require high lift while the longer pins make it difficult to have the reach to set the short pins. Or another situation will require you to lift a binding short pin behind a long pin which happens to be next in the binding order. What happens in this case is the lifting of the short pin to shear line causes the pick shaft to overlift the long pin in front of it. These are the situations where pinning configurations will make a lock more difficult to pick and require more finesse to accomplish. This is also a situation where slim line picks come in handy as their thinner shafts make it less likely to disturb a long pin while picking a short pin located in a pin chamber behind the chamber with a long pin that happens to be next in the binding order. The slim line picks will also allow you better access to lift a short pin that is starting to bind in a chamber located behind a chamber with a long pin that is already set to shear line. As stated, these situations show how pinning configurations can make a lock that is normally easy to pick very hard to pick or without proper picks virtually impossible to pick. It is not common in locks with fairly open warding that are pinned following MACS to be impossible to pick due to pinning configuration given that the picker has the proper tools available such as slim line picks or deep cut access picks.
Keep in mind that the above bittings are not a best practice bitting and the difficult bitting exceeds MACS for a kwikset lock so if you were to try pinning a lock in this manner and making a working key it is likely that if using factory style kwikset pins you can actually cut into two spaces when you cut a 6 in position 1 and a 0 in position two due to the width of the cut flat being .080" to .090" depending on the code machine used to create the original key. Taking this into account you can see that the code cuts made on the key going to the extreme of a deep 6 cut to a shallow 1 cut right after it it leaves very little bitting surface for the key to engage the number 1 cut after the six cut. So as you can see for a use in a working environment where a key is to be used the difficult bitting is not able to be used. Fortunately for us lockpicker MACS does not affect how we can pin a lock to practice.
As you can see buying a kwikset deadbolt or better yet, pick up a pair of keyed both side kwikset deadbolts which will give you by far the best value for your dollar and you will have 20 bottom pins to choose from to create your locks. With the two deadbolts having four keyed sides, you can sort your twenty pins to make an easy difficulty lock, medium difficulty lock, hard difficulty lock, and finally you can create the most difficult bitting arrangement you can come up with for a kwikset lock and be in picking heaven for a bit. The best part about using the kwikset deadbolt is the fact that they require no special tools to perform the repinning operation and the task is very easy. Simply remove the spring cover from the top of the shell (or bible if you prefer that term), turn the lock over and dump the pins out. Then sort the bottom and top pins as you please and reassemble your lock. One small word of advice, the fine folks at kwikset
might have installed one or two different sizes of top pins. The way to utilize these pins is simple, if you have a short bottom pin in a chamber you need to utilize the longer top pin above it. If you have a long bottom pin in a chamber you need to utilize the shorter top pin above it. This is called balancing the pin stacks. Not only does this ensure proper operation of the lock but in cases other than kwiksets with the press on top retaining caps it will prevent comb picking attacks.
Hopefully this post helps as I am dozing off as I write this so I do hope it is halfway coherent.
~Zeke79~
For the best book out there on high security locks and their operation, take a look at amazon.com for High-Security Mechanical Locks An Encyclopedic Reference. Written by our very own site member Greyman! A true 5 Star read!!
thanks heaps guys, yeah i have noticed i dont seem to be able to pick locks when im frustrated , which is probably due to over picking and to much tension and force. ohkay ill keep that in mind 
~cyber~