Hotroddal wrote:exactly what does shimming mean, I hear this word all over the place but I never found a definition for it?
It's a way of bypassing a lock by inserting a piece of metal into the lock around the shackle. The idea is to push the spring loaded mechanism away from the shackle, allowing the shackle to pop open freely. Some locks have 2 spring loaded mechanisms and require 2 shims to be used at the same time.
A lot of the better quality locks, however don't use these spring loaded mechanisms to hold the shackle in place, but instead rely on ball bearings which sit in grooves in the sides of a cylindric part which rotates as the plug is turned. This cylindric part itself is spring loaded and cannot be pushed away with a shim. I have seen on the back of packaging for some locks, a cutaway diagram which shows this type of mechanism.
Hope this helped.
