pick gun made out of a staple gun

[pickmachinist]

Pick gun made out of a staple gun. Well, I'm going to try it. I'll keep everyone updated on the progress and get some pictures along the way.

[sipple]

sounds like an interesting idea keep us updated, maybe a video or something of it in action...

[pickmachinist]

o.k., I found some good candidates at some yard sales over the weekend with a total investment of $2.50 for all 4. Still undecided on which one to cut up first. Only one of them, from what I can tell, has a variable adjustment for impact pressure. It's the one on the lower right.

[cppdungeon]

Go for the top right one!
It seems the major problem in making a snap pick out of these is the direction of the force. its down the "barrel" of the gun, not really a useful direction for what your doing. if you want to hold it comfortably, you will need to translate this motion to a motion at a different angle. ATM, you would have to hold the staple gun with the barrel pointing up to get that force going in the right direction.
Just my 2 cents.

--Cpp

[pickmachinist]

patience, my friend, patience...

[pickmachinist]

UPDATE: First, you choose.... Then you tear the thing apart and chop off all the excess stuff you don't need...

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Then, clean up the edges where you cut everything off and you end up with something like this:

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To be continued...

[zeke79]

Pickmachinist, your creativity and quality work always amazes me. Keep up the good work. Maybe after this you can tool up and make a pick for that tubar lock which would be really cool. Then you could make a simple decoder similar to that which comes with a standard tubular pick so after picking you could take readings from your pick tool and keys could be milled easily with some flat stock to obtain a working key. One could even go so far as to make their key with a dremel tool as you have done if they have a steady hand, some stock close to the right thickness, and a bit of time.

I think it would be easiest if going the dremel tool route to disassemble the lock while making the key and start with a single pinned chamber and add a pin stack at a time while making the cuts. The advantage of using a mill would be that you could setup a couple dial indicators and you could make your cuts easily and accurately using the dial indicators and make all of the cuts at one time without removing the new key from your vise as you wouldn't have to disassemble the lock and test the cut on each pin stack individually. With the info derived from your decoding tool and your mill you could as said make all of your cuts without multiple setups. A little dykem will help. Of course you could skip your dial indicator if your dials read clearly and are accurate with no backlash when plunging in and then back out. Of course you know all of this stuff and likely know it better than I do as I am just a hobby machinist but always fall back on my brother if I run into problems who is a machinist by trade. Sorry if some of this doesn't make total sense as it is getting late here and I am about to fall asleep typing this.

[raimundo]

Ive made a few snappers, they seem to work well, and I have devised a simple test of the the power of these things, Its done like this, if you are right handed, hold a quarter on two horizontal parallel fingers, and spread the fingers a bit. put the tip of the snapper under the quarter, so the end of the snapper is at the edge of the quarter, and part of the length is all the way across the bottom of the quarter. the snapper probe should be in contact with the flat bottom of the quarter. then press the snapper halfway down, and release. this should launch the quarter to about the height of your nose.

This is my test for the power of the launch, I first used dimes but they fly so high they usually arc off to the left or right, making relative comparisons difficult.

By using a quarter, you can figure others in the US can compare their launch height to yours, people in Europe will have to use a different coin to compare launch power.

Just a little something I started playing with.

[pickmachinist]

That seems like a pretty good test method.
I've got a couple different ideas that I'm tossing around on this pick gun... I could mount a cam or ramp to transfer the power up instead of out. By turning the staple gun backwards and modifying a few peices of it's hardware, it would also be possible to make a rake pick that would have near instant withdrawal of the pick from the keyway. In theory, it should work niceley either way.

[MacGnG1]

this is getting to be an interesting project, please continue. i wanna see the results.

[pickmachinist]

We're getting closer to the climax!
I turned a pin on my lathe that I used to reverse the direction of the "staple gun". I had to do some drilling and trimming here and there to get the new pin in and to get the factory spring to fit right. Now, turn the gun around and where the impact adjustment was, is where the pin sticks out of it. I added a spring behind the pin to cushion the return somewhat. This pin eases out as you squeeze the handle until the last second when it snaps back in. The stroke (right now it's about 3/4") is adjustable, although I'm still experimenting with that. I will machine a small pick holder to mount on the end of the pin and make a few different picks for it. This would probably work the best with a rake or ball because of the linear motion and velocity.

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If it works halfway decent I'll smooth it out, polish it and put it up for trade.

[LearningTheArt]

Wow . Very nice, wish I had the resources to make that work of art.

[pickmachinist]

Thanks 'learningtheart'. I don't know that I would call it a work of art yet, but maybe it does look a little better in the pictures! I've made a few changes to improve it's movement and have it working pretty well now. I made a crazy little attachment to hold the picks and modified the pin with a groove to accept it. Now, all I have to do is make a few picks and cut a slot at the end of my contraption to hold the pick. I will probably just slot it and put a pin at the rear of the slot with a set-screw toward the front to clamp the pick in place.

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[raimundo]

A staple is shoved into wood for its full lenght, but a snapper is restricted to only a few millimeters, I assume that is why you needed to cut a new pin?

[pickmachinist]

Very good point raimundo! That is normally true. The staple gun has that linear motion that drives the staples as much as 1/2". Whereas a pick gun doesn't typically travel that direction. This pick gun goes against all pick gun designs by actually working like a reverse bump key. By using a snake style pick, you should be able to 'bump' the lock open by the rapid withdrawal of the pick from the cylinder when the gun snaps. The pin I had to make was to extend out of the 'staple gun' on the opposite side the staples came from, reversing the direction of the snap, and to give me something to attach a pick to. Maybe it will work and maybe it won't. I've never seen one made this way and just had to try it out.