combination reset on 3 button dial combination lock

[finch]

I bought a new vangaurd aluminum laptop carrier with dual combination locks. I set the combination. My friend scrambled all 3 dials to test it. Somehow in doing this, the combination was reset. I have spent days trying to find the right numbers. Luckily, the case is still open. The company had no advice when I called them. I cannot afford to replace it and I have an flight upcoming and will need the case to work.

[vector40]

You can't just try every possible combination? I assume it's a standard multi-wheel combination lock; if there are only three wheels, there are only a thousand combinations, which shouldn't take you more than a few minutes to go through.

There's at least one common means of manipulating these locks to yield the combo, but frankly, with only three digits, why bother.

It's worth keeping in mind that if the number "somehow" got changed just by scrambling the wheels, you may have a defective case, and this is not a problem that will go away. Not sure I'd trust it.