Ilco Marlok key

[phoneman85]

Here is an Ilco Marlok key I got from my recent stay at the Grand America Hotel in Salt Lake City Utah:


The black strips cover a series of holes cut in the key and are read by infrared light. (The black material is IR transparent)
You insert and remove the key to operate it, no turning involved. All the locks are hard wired to the main computer system and use audit trail software. Pretty cool stuff!

[dll932]

I retrofitted a mortise lock with a Marlok cylinder. Very simple and clever. A ribbon cable came out the back of the cylinder and went through the door the control module. You could hook a laptop up to it and download an audit trail.

[phoneman85]

The mortice cylinders are online for $15-$25, I plan to get one just to have with the key. I was reading an article on these stating the control box is actually the weakest point, as it's secured with a cheap lock. I won't go into how the author said to bypass it for fear of getting banned, but you can find it using google pretty easily.

Overall it's a very clever and unique system! On first seeing the key, I figured it had to be RFID or something similar, until I read it's actually IR. Don't see how you could "copy" a key easily.

[dll932]

Come to think of it, I thought the keys had mag stripes. The one I put in used a mortise cyl in a mortise lock-you put the key in, the cyl unlocked and you turned the key to drive the bolt work.

[phoneman85]

Ok, I bet there's a solenoid in the cylinder that unlocks to allow it to rotate. The locks at the hotel didn't have mortise cylinders, but were almost like a Euro style. with them, you inserted and removed the key then turned the handle. They probably had different styles for different applications.

[dll932]

No doubt. I only saw the kind I installed.

[jeffmoss26]

I will try to remember and post a picture of the Marlok key I've got!

[Lauren]

I have one of these keys without the black strips. It appears that the key has a variable of square holes that get read like an old computer punch card.

[dll932]

Then it must be infrared.