Homebrew pick set

[pick_maker]

Hey. FNG here. Just wanted to share a set I may or may not have made after lurking here since January. Some post in March recommended a plumbing snake- - which is a hand-cranked drain unclogger- for a good source of spring steel. For about $6.00 I got almost sixty 5 inch lengths from a 25 foot snake. The black baton-looking thing is a fitted leather case I made which holds 24 picks and tension tools.





For the warded picks and jigglers I used steel from a crosscut saw. The different key shapes indicate different steel thickness. I made pick templates using the Autoshapes in Microsoft Word97 and then laser printed on sticky back label paper.

That pick gun is made from an old coat hangar and the tip has been thinned and slimmed. The steel properties of clothes hangars and coat hangars are not the same so don't dash off and raid the closets. Coat hangar steel is more tensile because coats are heavier. After my first thumb blister healed I tried picking again- 4 out of 5 pins. More pics soon.

[WhiteHat]

*sniff* it's....it's....beautiful....

[PYRO1234321]

Hard core sweet

[Romstar]

I am VERY impressed. It's not often that you see workmanship of this quality. Keep up the excellent work.

In the meantime, perhaps you could share the shapes with everyone else. There seems to be a huge lack of templates out there.

This set should be a standard by which others are judged. Aspiring pickers take note, THIS is what you can do when you set your mind to it.

Congratulations.
Romstar[/i]

[maldotcom2]

That is...SO....COOL

[yungning]

is that a tension wrench in the middle?
for wafer locks?

[mbell]

WOW - Really nice picks.

Obviously been some time spent making them rakes...

[RodVT]

Very impressive.

Rod

[pick_maker]

Thank you all for the feedback! Made my day. When you have standard size material you can really crank 'em out. Two weeks on the whole set. All pick shapes were found on the 'net. I call the first one on the left (top pic)-- the finger.

[pick_maker]

A standard tool and a rendition of the Falle torqe tool. These were bent cold i.e. without a torch and it is tricky to do sometimes, especially on the Falle.

[CitySpider]

How effective is the faux-Falle?

[pick_maker]

When making picks yourself, the tricky part is making sure the business end of the pick is the right proportion to the distance between the pins. I cut apart this cheap $5 Defiant cylinder to first use as a training tool. Watching the pick in action close up you can see how the pins respond to the pick shape, which pin set first, third et cetera.

[pick_maker]

Spider,
Because it is not adjustable the Falle will only work in certain keyways. I have to keep a thumb and index finger on it to create torque- else it will fall out of the lock. It does leave a lot of open room for a pick unlike a L-shape tool.

[Mad Mick]

Jayzus!! That's a beautiful set Pick_maker. I'm guessing you probably work with your hands for a living, as tools of that quality are rarely produced by a pen-pusher. Congratulations, you've set a benchmark.

[lock_assassin]

Definetly a nice pick set! Those look better than some of the first picks I ever bought. They are for sure the nicest homemade set I have seen yet. Thanks for sharing!!!

lock_assassin