need help with spool pins

[DWHGLH1]

i have tried feeling one at a time and am still having troble --any tips?

[Romstar]

Not really.

Go lightly, use a lifter or hook pick, and try to feel the slight grap as you pass each pin.

Just practice feeling the pins. Count the pins, move them up and down. Learn how they move.

No other magic other than practice and familiarity with the feelings.

Romstar

[logosys]

i have tried feeling one at a time and am still having troble --any tips?

It seems cliche' but the more you practice, the better you'll be able to feel them out. I would personally reccommend starting with just 1 spool pinned stack, just so you get a feel for how the stack will feel when it is false binding. Then slowly increase your number of pin stacks to five (still with only 1 spool in there) Once you've done that and feel comfortable with it, throw in another spool. Once you've done that a few times, you'll have a pretty good understanding of how they feel, and you can add more if you like...

That's how I did it at least.

[Exodus5000]

Perhaps you're using a lock that is too difficult to start with. Which lock are you practicing on?

[tastyfish]

you probally all ready know this but just in case you dont (in the verry unlikey chance you dont) you need to use light tention

use a lifter or hook pick

athough you should probablly go with what romstar said, i personally like to use a steep half dimond for any spool/mushroom pin

[Cat]

I'm stuck on a 5 spool pin lock as well. the master 930/6230.

its hard because i have to manipulate the tension with my thumb while i'm holding the lock. i can feel a lot more when i use my whole hand. i need a vice or something.

[tastyfish]

try useing your index finger for the tention wrench

[Buggs41]

I am in the same boat. Trying to work on my Master Pro 6121. Some day I will win.

[Bonuts]

i can consistantly get my brinks 101-40001 to turn about 5-6 degrees. When i feel the pins (and look at the key) it seems like the 4th pin is set high. do any of you know if they used mushroomed key pins?

[tastyfish]

well it sounds like it does have mushroom/spool pins in it. try lighting the tention and when you press on the pin it should pull the wrench back a little let it but still keep tention on it(you got to balance it)

[DWHGLH1]

thanks for all the great tips guys . i took my lock apart and tried it one at a time. now i'm up to three pins thanks.

[Buggs41]

I am in the same boat. Trying to work on my Master Pro 6121. Some day I will win.

I finally won! Got it four times so far tonight.

I had to use a medium tension wrench. A light tension wrench was not wide enough, and kept slipping through the ward slots of the keyway.

My choice of pick was a hook. In reading other posts in this thread, this was by far the best working pick for spool pins. ( Thanks all )

At first, I thought my hook was binding against the tension tool at the bottom of the keyway, and giving me the reverse rotation common with a spool/mushroom pin.

In fact, it was the pin itself. Now, I had to adapt to how to control the tension while picking this padlock. I found the best approach was to use my index finger resting on the body of the lock, with my tension wrench ahead of it. This gave me a solid piont to gauge the action of the tension wrench to. When the pin was pushing back, I felt it. And if I needed to increase, or decrease tension, all I had to do was roll my fingertip on the body of the lock.

[S3rratedSp00L]

Congratulations on the pro 6121! Those pro series locks are much harder than the typical master lock! Good work!

[quickpicks]

I cracked my pro series on the first try. Light tension is key to opening theese ones.

[datalife12]

some locks have lower spool pins.Sometimes using a probe you can often feel the shoulder of the spool,which feels different from a short pin because of its shape.If you find a lower pin,file down the cut for that pin until its stop marking.Impression all the other pins normally.When only the spool is left to be impressioned the plug will turn a little and catch on the spool pin. At that point,file down the cut for the spool pin until it begins to mark again.Then continue filling it just a little bit more to bring the dividing line between the upper and lower pins down into alignment with the shear line.