Best Alloy For Lock Picks

[shaofutzer]

Sorry to resurrect a dead thread but I make a lot picks. It's a hobby of mine. I actually prefer 6Al-4V titanium alloy for picks. I started with hacksaw blades but they were either too bendy or too brittle. I tried street sweeper bristles but could never find enough of them to feed my hobby. I met up with a knifemaker friend of mine who had some .025 6Al-4V sheet in his shop. I asked if I could mess around and make a pic out a scrap piece. I ended up making a short thin hook. That was 4 years ago. I still use the same pick. A lot... I get more feedback using it than I do with spring or stainless steel and besides some light scratching, it still pretty much looks like it did the day I made it. 316 grade stainless is not going to be tougher than properly treated 6Al-4V. I work with both on the regular and 316 stainless in my opinion is a poor choice for pick material. The low carbon and high alloy content makes heat treating properly difficult... oh yeah - and you CAN heat treat 6Al-4V. I don't know why there's so much hate for titanium. Maybe people were using pure Ti or the wrong alloy? Is it material cost? I get my titanium free, so woohah! That's not an issue for me.

[cuttinedge1]

I thin .15 is a little thin expecialy for titanium. I have had great luck with D2 tool steel because it is very tough. I had an app that had thousands of types of steel and shoed their make up but I cant remember it name.

[huxleypig]

I have actually been looking for some good quality, high carbon steel recently. Spring steel would be great, in varying thicknesses ranging from 0.2mm (8 thou) to 0.5mm (20 thou).

If anyone in the UK can help because I am struggling to get this in small amounts.

[Shifty1]

Im a machinist by trade and I figure I know steel as good as a carpenter knows wood. Cobalt grade hacksaw blades are .024 thick and are as tough as a hounds tooth. I recently made 2 Deforest type picks with a .035 cross section on the secondary angle near the tip of the pick and boy are they strong! I use nice stainless Southord picks also but they would deform easily with the pressure that I can direct upon shatterproof steel.

[Slayer85]

Better quality kitchen knifes are well suited to be cut to lets say a Bogota tool.

Better quality knifes are usually made out of good metals. Plus you already have a comfortable handle on it.

If you are after just pure strength, if I remember right C51 steel should be brilliant.

[Squelchtone]

Better quality kitchen knifes are well suited to be cut to lets say a Bogota tool.

Better quality knifes are usually made out of good metals. Plus you already have a comfortable handle on it.

If you are after just pure strength, if I remember right C51 steel should be brilliant.

here's another "what's the best material for lock picks" thread for your enjoyment: http://www.lockpicking101.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=54290

Squelchtone

[Jacob Morgan]

The question maybe should be, what good metal is good that can be had in the thickness one wants and in a width that is close to what one wants to end up with? Heat treating picks can be done (given heat-treatable metal), but home heat treating can be fiddly and some heat treat procedures for the more exotic metals may be difficult if not impossible in a home shop. Given that, there is something to be said for metal that comes in the proper hardness--if one does not overheat the metal then the pick is already hardened. One thing that fits the bill perfectly is blue tempered 1095 spring steel. Sources for this steel are below. We can go on about exotic metals, but if it is not readily obtainable in the right dimensions and it is not pre-hardened then it may not be viable for very many people. And there is little point in talking about some alloy that only exists in truck load quantities, or only as 11 gauge sheet, or requires a professional heat treat furnace to harden properly, etc.

I like metal working myself, but I think that the designs one makes are of greater interest than the metal one makes them out of. My favorite locksmithing book is a (now defunct) correspondence course from the 1960's. It came with some patterns for picks--and I swear there has not been much new since then. Surely the community can come up with more designs that have not been around for decades?

Sources:
McMaster-Carr http://www.mcmaster.com/#grade-1095-steel-strips/=12r8hdj
MSC Industrial https://www.mscdirect.com/browse/tn/Raw-Materials/Steel-Coils?searchterm=1095+steel&navid=4287924490#navid=4287924490+4288143949+4288248058&searchterm=1095+steel

[nine4t4]

I feel that trying to find the perfect metallurgy is quixotic and overly complicating things. Jacob has the right idea, a consistently thick stock that you can easily shape.

In the local dollar store I've found various nice pieced of metal that are around .020". Kitchen spatulas, knives, drywal spatulas. A buck or two usally yields enough for 5 picks. Sometimes it's stuff thick enough for things like prybars.

Brick Strapping!!! Nice springy, resilient and free. And the lighter stuff is almost perfect in thickness and width.

You also have to realize that in some cases pick makers choose the material not because it's better for picks, but because that's what their equipment will work best at shaping. But it still comes down to the specific thickness of the stock.

[Maddogrecurve]

First, to Shrub: stainless steel is by definition an alloy, as is any other form of steel. If it isn't, it's called iron, not steel, and iron would make some really crappy picks. In fact, stainless 316, which you suggested, is actually a pretty serious alloy, with 16-18% chromium, 10-14% nickle, and only 61.8-72% iron. Oh, and I personally see no problem with making a forum post as part of doing research. After all, why reinvent the wheel?



Second, as to the question regarding what alloy to use:


Low/medium carbon steels (~0.4%-~1.25%): Avoid if possible. these offer the worst performance of any materials in this list. Some medium carbon steels may work okay, but not nearly as well as spring steels (almost exclusively high-carbon) or stainless.

Spring steels(~1.2%-~2.0%): If you go with a spring steel, try to stick with something similar to ASTM A228. I've used this for years now with much success, but I would recommend a thicker sheet. Also, if you do use this, make sure it's not full-hard. If it is, then you will be fishing the tip out of a lock for weeks. Instead, go with spring-temper or half-hard. Also, if one of these alloys is to soft for any reason, just do a good quench-and-temper. You can make these alloys far harder than you could ever want.

Stainless steels: If you don't have an issue with the price, this is a better option than spring steel. 302 is a cheaper option that should do just fine, unless you regularly bend the picks into odd shapes (not smart). 316 is a higher performance alloy than 302, but it's not a standard material, and as such will be more expensive.

Titanium Alloys: These don't offer much, especially when you can easily match the strength with spring and stainless steels. These are normally reserved for weight-critical applications such as aircraft and high-speed, unbalanced machines. They are meant to match the strength of steel, but at the density of aluminum. The only respectable reasons to make a set of picks out of this is as a show-piece, or in some weird case that the weight of the pick makes a significant difference in how well you can feel your way around, as may be the case with some ultra high-end locks. In that case, you would want the 6-4 alloy just as you suggested, or perhaps ATI 425, which offers almost identical, if not slightly superior performance in most aspects, and is notably easier to machine.



In general, picks should be tougher (read: less brittle, softer, etc.) than the torque wrench, with the only exception being a spring-assisted torque wrench. I bring all of my picks to a spring temper (yes, even the stainless ones can be spring tempered), but I only bring the wrench to the tougher end of the yellow/orange temper region. Also, keep in mind that people have different preferences about the tools they use. You may decide you like something springier than the next guy. Just bear in mind that as the wrench/picks get springier, they also absorb more of the clicks, making it harder to feel your way around.

for reference, the temper colors can be found here: http://www.anvilfire.com/index.php?body ... ilfire.com

The chart is for carbon steels only, but the only difference for most stainless steels is that the same colors occur at high temperatures. Also, the properties are primarily color-related at a very fundamental level. Blue temper will have the same general properties, even if in one steel blue occurs 200 degrees hotter.

Hope that answered your questions!

Thank you! I was going to say that alloys are hard to avoid as anytime iron is added to, it becomes an alloy.

[stratmando]

Has Monel been Mentioned? How would it rate?

[Jacob Morgan]

Has Monel been Mentioned? How would it rate?

Monel is an alloy of copper and nickel and it has fabulous resistance to corrosion, even in boiling hydrofloric acid. (Although it is prone to bimetallic corrosion.) It does not become brittle at low temperatures. Would be just the thing for picking locks in the winter in Siberia. It is non-sparking, for what it is worth.

But it is several times more expensive than steel and you might have to go with a special alloy with hardening elements to get it very hard, and I doubt it would ever be nearly as tough and rigid as ordinary spring steel. Some of the alloys can be hardened some with heat treatment, but it requires special equipment (not the country blacksmith heat it to red, quench, then draw a temper--this stuff has to be held at very high temperatures for hours and taken to other temperatures for hours.) Other than the novelty of it, not real clear what it would have on stainless or high-carbon steel, other than resistance to becoming brittle in sub-zero temperatures. Is there a particular property of it you find interesting?

[GWiens2001]

It always amazes me at the knowledge of members on this forum. It seems no matter the question, there is someone here who knows a very surprising amount about the subject.

Gordon