Friday night jgor dropped by my house with a bag full of Euro locks and a few new toys, including this little beauty. We sat around picking for close to 5 hours. Good times.
I'm at a slight disadvantage comparing this latest picks to your earlier designs because I don't personally own any. (Something I am now tempted to correct)
Often the best tools are "specialists", and this hybrid pick is no exception. The long, thin tang provides exceptional feedback and reach, without ever feeling too yielding. The finger notch cutout is thin enough to also a second zone of flexibility, which over time I discovered was tunable by changing the position of my grip. Very nice indeed.
I picked a selection of my own low-to-mid grade US locks which I was very familiar with since I figured I knew them, and knew what their quirks are. I was able to successfully open them all. On some locks, such as American 1105's and Schlage F keyways, this pick performs exceptionally. On other locks with shorter, smaller keyways, such as Master #140's and Abus 28/70 "Buffo", it perform adequately, but the flexibility becomes a bit difficult to manage because so much of the tang is floating in space. I don't view this as a failure of the pick, but rather a case of using the wrong tool for the job.
I also attempted to pick a selection of Euro cylinders which jgor brought. This was the first time I've tried Euros, and these (I hope) were a fairly hard lot. (Mostly SKG ** and a few ***)
I have a new respect for Euro locks. I failed horribly on pretty much every one of them I tried, but this is entirely due to the user, not the tool.
The wardings on these locks were, in a word, insane. Pretty much none of our standard tools fit, and I ended up grinding out a quick-and-dirty "micro" wrench just to get some sort of grip. The LN21 Hybrid was one of the few picks I was able to navigate around the inside of them, and it produced much easier pin-sets than other tools. I think this is due to both the thinness of the pick and the notched tip.
There are a few things which aren't negatives, but should be kept in mind:
- I find the handle too short to be optimal for the (admittedly non-standard) overhand grip I prefer. I doubt this will be an issue for 90% of users, but in a perfect world, I'd like to see another 3/4" to 1" in length in the handle.
- The notched tip does provide nice tactile feedback finding the bottoms of pins; however, I have to wonder how rough it is on the pins when locks are picked repeatedly. If you are a locksmith, I don't see this as a problem, but a hobbyist might.
- The thinness of the tang obviously makes this a delicate pick. I had no concern of that ever being a problem for me, but I would never lend it to someone learning to pick. (Again, not a negative, but this is not a beginner's tool)
- I'd like to see a tiny bit more curve in the tip of the pick. Setting an extreme low-high-low bitting was a little hard on the one or two locks I tried which I knew well enough to have a feel for that. Additionally, there were some of the really nasty warded Euros where I felt I couldn't get the rotational angle of the pick right becase the curve was hitting the wards. (I can't prove this. My lack of Euro skills could be the entire
In short, this is an excellent specialist pick. It's only "weakness" in my opinion are where tradeoff's were made between being a decent general pick, and an excellent specialist pick, and frankly, I'm happier with it being an excellent specialist.
