feras04 wrote:I thought its better to practice on one thats in use so you get a feel of it...I opened it with my key and even tried it with the door open and the thing still wont turn...
I did read around i lifted up the pins with a rake tool..
just wonderin what im missing, is there another secret pin hidden somewhere or somthin to push
This is just an observation and not personal criticism, but it is interesting to see the ownership people take when dealing with keys issued to them for their apartment, dorm room, or office at work. You mentioned that you opened it with "my key" and although to most people who are not involved in locks that makes perfect sense, I have to pose the question: Is this in fact your key or is it a key that was issued to you to open a lock that is also owned by another party, such as a landlord, college, or work? One of the things you will notice on this forum is an almost spontaneous flurry of replies to a post such as this one about not picking a lock that doesn't belong to you, even if you were given a key to it and it is the lock for "your dorm room" or "your apartment door" I've been more than vocal at jumping on new users to tell them this is inappropriate behavior, and that there is a possibility you may accidentally damage the lock's functionality by spilling out some of the little pins inside, because while picks can open a lock as a key does, a key also fills the entire keyway and stops other things from happening, such as master pins falling out, when the plug is rotated in excess of 180 degrees.
I suppose we're quick to reply to posts where a photo is posted of a "lock in use" because we've all been there and made that mistake before, so this is some sort of attempt at helping new users not make the same mistakes and to avoid the same old pit falls.
Just remember, the keys you were issued and the lock that they turn, which I'm just guessing are to a dorm or apartment, are not in fact your property, so fiddling with it is not a nice thing to do, unless you are ready to have the lock serviced, or you can fix yourself any issue that may come up from picking it. Believe me, I know its a very tempting target, it's the lock you use every day, the lock you see most often, and when you're first starting out and don't have a box full of practice padlocks and cylinders, I think the natural thing to do is to go for the most obvious lock, the one on the front door. Try to resist that urge, it leads down a dark road. After you pick your dorm door and tell a couple friends, you may notice you have a couple friends who will treat you differently. A few may thing its a cool skill, a few may start treating you like a thief, and if anything ever goes missing up or down your hallway, your name may come up in conversation very quickly as that guy in room x that likes to pick locks.
As for your post, just lifting all the pins doesn't open a lock. You have to lift each pin only the distance that the real keys cuts would lift each pin. Look at your key, it has valleys of different depths, its not just a flat line, right?
Read this document, you'll be saying "ohhh, I get it now" all day long.
http://lockpickguide.com/support-files/lsiguide.pdfSquelchtone
