Master Keying: Software, Physical Approach?

[Raccoon]

Alright. I was just contracted to masterkey (from scratch) a new elementary school being built in our town. About 160 locks, and they chose Yale locks (for whatever reason ).

I have in front of me a schedule including Key Codes (A,AA,SKDs), Location, Door #, Head #, Lock #, Finish and Hand.

These fields are fairly obvious, except I'm not sure what Head # is. I'm also fairly fortunate in this case, as they have already decided how they want these doors to be keyed. All I need to do is create the bitings for each lock.

But in a situation where someone simply says "we need these doors keyed", how would a locksmith go about determining the needs of the key holders for effective access control? Do you interview the various managers to determine how they go about day to day opening doors? Or should all institutions have a single security advisor on staff to make these decisions for you?

What are the various master key control software out there, and perhaps a brief review including pros/cons/features/expense?

What would you recommend for key stamping? Should one stick with AA1 AA2 etc, or arbitrarily number keys on a lookup table? Are hand stamps worth their price for a professional look, or just engrave keys by hand? Are there other options for stamping?

Thanks.

[HeadHunterCEO]

call whomever gave you the contract and ask who is the individual making these decisions


that way when you get input from 15 diffrent people yoiu always have one person to pin the decision on

[Shrub]

Yes there will be the one person to be confiring with as regards who should have access to where,

Stamping can look untidy if you do not line them up properly but lined up ok and eveny stamped will be fine, do not go down the free hand engraving route as it will look a mess,
You can get pro key ingravers but they cost a bit, maybe a local dog tag engraving specialist or cup engraver would do you a deal but to be honest your better off haveing a bit of a practice and simply stamp them,

Ive got a engraver that works like a pantagraph and provides great results but its not worth setting up for a few keys, for a load of keys its worth it,

As for numbers it doesnt really matter what they are labeled as if they are correctly marked in the flow chart or on the map, im not sure of the legal aspects of keping a copy of such a map where you are but the customer needs a full and detailed set of paperwork on what is what,

Dont forget to depth the keys downward so that a master key cant be made to a grand master key for example and a normal key cant be made into a master key if that makes sence,

Im not sure what head# is,

[raimundo]

I would assume that you would take a random approach to the individual keys, rather than assign them according to the first collumn of the masterkey progressions, this would keep the keys from looking alike, and thus allowing shady characters like mattblaze from recognizing the bitting of the masterkey after seeing two individual keys. If the system is new, you probably have security flaws that are unknown, but will become apparent when its put into operation, in any case, the whole security shouldn't be just locks, there should be some cameras in a proper facist highschool.

[Raccoon]

Heh, thanks raimundo. Actually, I already found a security flaw. The administrative offices and records vault are keyed to the same single building-wide master key. This is not only amazingly insecure as any custodian can break into the dean's office or steal student files-- but it's highly illegal. Records rooms must be keyed different from the master system.

Shrub: What would you recommend in stamp sets. I was going to just buy one of these sets from lockpicks.com or lockpickshop.com.. you know the hand stamp set. Then I thought, perhaps I should buy 3 sets, so I can line them up and strike each stamp as all 3 are aligned. I think these stamps have a square edge to them for decent aignment.

Otherwise, what will give me a professional stamping?

[Shrub]

Well stamping multiple stamps always leaves the letters looking a mess as they always seem to stamp unevenly, you can however get holders that you can hold the stamps together with but ive not tryed them,

A good eye or maybe a bit of steel or wood clamped to the key via the table should give a good straight edge,

Even a pencil line on the key would work,

You may but only may get away with a cheap engraver and stencil, just an idea

[Raccoon]

I see HPC makes a stamp holder, I just noticed it while revisiting lockpicks.com. They sell it for $184 however lockmasters.com quoted me $168 over the phone. It's up in the air who I'll order from, depending on who can supply me with the mass of yale pins I'm going to need.

What would you pay for a bag of 100 yale pins of a given size? My local supplier quoted me $5.20 a bag, but most pins online cost only $1.00 a bag. Only problem is, nobody sells yale pins online (that i can find).

[zeke79]

CLK supplies carries SP pin refills in .03 and .05 incriments. You just need to know what yale pins you need as off top of my head I believe there is a small and large yale pin set. Dont quote me on that though. Their refills are either 100 or 144 pins per pouch and much cheaper than 5.20 each.

[Raccoon]

I was thinking that too, but the perfectionist of me is nagging that the job should be done with yale brand pins. I'm just going to include both brands in my quote and allow the contractor to decide what he wants to spend. Brockhage offered the pins to me for $4.16 custom order, but then there's a 2 week wait and shipping fees. I trust they are getting the pins at the lowest price possible, so Yale brand pins are just expensive.

[zeke79]

Being a master system it would not be a bad idea to use OEM pins. Be sure to also pick up all of the master pins you will need also. If you have the information you need about the system and proper software you can print out a pinning chart that will tell you exactly how many pins of each size you will need. That will save you a few bucks from over ordering a large amount.

Also, I do not know how everyone else does it here but I always try to avoid the #1 or smallest master pin in a master system.

[Raccoon]

Yeah, I've learned that much... I'll be avoiding #1 wafers.

I'm working out the dynamics of putting this system together. I do not own any master keying software, so I assume I'll have to eat part of that cost as I can't pawn the full cost of the software on a single contract.

What software do you use or recommend?

I'm also trying to determine how to bill this. I have the variables of: Cost of pin stock, Cost of key stock, Cost of cutting (i'll have to farm this out to a friend), Hourly Rate, Arbitrary pinning per cylinder fee, and cost of designing the master system.

Some of those variables would seem to be in direct conflict. For example, if I'm charging pin stock, key stock and an hourly rate, is it unfair to charge $10 per cylinder on top of that? Does the $10 per cylinder generally cover pin and key stock? Or should I charge it anyway.

The master hierarchy is already supplied to me, though I have pointed out a couple logistic and legal errors in the system. Never the less, my only part in the system is generating the key bitings. This is a 1 level master key system, with about 110 locks. What should I charge for this service in itself, or should it be included with the (hourly + per cylinder) charge?

This is my first job of this scale, so I don't want to burn any bridges, but, they have said that *I* will be the one to do this job, it needs to be done in 2-1/2 weeks, and this will be my duty [no matter the cost?]. They are in a bind, so I do want to take certain advantage of it, within reason.

[zeke79]

I have used several different softwares from Key Mastery to Pro Master 5 to Treskats to Multi Master Pro and I like Superkey 2000 myself as it is easy to use for the small stuff I do.

[yng_pick]

As far as the charges-

For small jobs, we charge a service fee to go to the job (between 35-45 locally), and then
8.50 a rekey if it has existing keys
10.50 if there are no existing keys (and an additional labor charge if all locks must be picked)
12.50 for master system rekeys-
all of these charges per cylinder. this cost includes the pins, the work to rekey, and generally, 1 key.

Of course, we change it depending on if it is a large job. In this case they may charge hourly in addition to the above, or raise the per cylinder price to include the long time needed to rekey all.

I think both methods are fine- you might want to bump up the price of per cylinder that you normally charge to account for the pins, blanks, etc- as the general prices must change when it becomes more expensive. I've never been really keen on hourly- mainly because I feel that certain things should take me a certain time- and If I were rekeying 170 locks, im sure that there would be the occasional one that i mis pinned, or what ever problem, that would add time- and I would want to base it on what I felt should be the exact time.
Or something like that.. I know a lot of people do hourly, I'm just not accustomed to it.

[Shrub]

Dont forget the pins you will get from stripping the locks in the first place if the locks are new,

Yale pins are £1.00 for 144 here which is around $1.80 i think.

[Raccoon]

Dude. I wish we could get Yale pins that cheap! I tried everywhere, but they're in excess of $4.00 and usually $6.00.

The contractor and a friend locksmith both advized I should just use LAB pins. I'm going to compare Yale pin sizes to the LAB pins available, especially the master pins. I really don't want to skimp, but Yale pins cost 5x as much. I know there are fresh pins in the locks already, but it would be a pain to gauge pins as I dump plugs.

I'm also curious-- Is there any reason one should avoid putting master pins in any particular pin stack? One locksmith suggests never putting them in the far pin stack, while another suggests never putting them in the first. I can understand not putting it in the first-- as the first stack receives most of the wear-- but why not the last stack?