Question on Medeco Keyways

[devildog]

Which ones besides M3 are still restricted, i.e. have a current patent on them? How long until those patents expire?

It just struck me that you might be able to get a medeco restricted keyway without having the pay the exorbitant price for the new M3, maybe...I know the old commercial biaxial keyway expired, but what about G3, Z, S1, S3 G/S/Z-whatever etc. etc. etc.?

[unbreakable]

The patent no. on my Z key is 4,635,455.

I dont know if this helps any, maybe you know where you can check the Patent no. somewhere?

If you can check them somewhere, can you please post the site.

Thanks,

[unbreakable]

Never mind, I found the site, this is what it found for Patent no. 4,635,455

[unbreakable]

And here's the search engine for th patent office- Patent Office search

[darrel.h]

I have seen some biaxial locks with the circular key and some square ones with the pacman guy on it. What is the diffrence?

[linty]

the pacman guy you're talking about is just the biaxial logo. it's made to represent what the offset pins look like when viewed from below. so far as i know, round is for regular keyways and square is for restricted keyways.

[wry415]

S1 and S6 are the Biaxial "Commercial Keyways," which any Medeco-servicing locksmith should be able to duplicate on demand. These two keyways need no authorization card, signature verification, or any other special procedures. They're the Biaxial equivalent of the Original 00 ("Air") keyway.