What did you pick today?

[greengrowlocks]

Just opened this NW4 for the first time just now. It's quite similar to the Yale in design with exception of the angled pins. Now working on the MT5+ and Dom D. I could not find the Dom being gutted anywhere and am curious to see the internals of one if anyone has more information. I feel something spring loaded at the back of the keyway but it is not a pin. I'm guessing it needs to be depressed after the pins are set?

NW4

[dontlook]

Yesterday I picked my LOTO lock three times. I have been working on the LOTO locks for a while.
This bitting was easier than the one that has been escaping me for a year(but that one got spun, and dropped the pins).


Today I picked this American 1100(twice). The bitting is high low high low (although not too far apart).

[greengrowlocks]

I've been spending most of my picking time the last few days trying to open a new gen Bilock but whenever I feel close to getting it open I hit a wall. After countless hours of frustration I decided to switch gears and try this mini Desmo padlock I've had and haven't opened until today. It was a relief getting something new open this week. Also got my first "fully pinned" Medeco open albeit a 3 pin payphone lock.

[adi_picker]

Nice work greengrow! How different is the NW4 from the MT5? Looks like 5 regular dimples and 4 sliders, vs the 5 pin in pin and 5 sliders on the MT5. Is this right? What was the Desmo like? I would love to have a go on one of these but have never seen one for a decent price.

adi_picker

[greengrowlocks]

Nice work greengrow! How different is the NW4 from the MT5? Looks like 5 regular dimples and 4 sliders, vs the 5 pin in pin and 5 sliders on the MT5. Is this right? What was the Desmo like? I would love to have a go on one of these but have never seen one for a decent price.

adi_picker

Yeah that's correct on the differences between the NW4 and MT5. When picking the NW4 I was able to pick the dimples first and sliders second. The sliders though do not have any false gates so were pretty easy to set and the dimples were nothing special. I just got my MT5 about a week ago and haven't dedicated too much time to it. Most my efforts have been with this Bilock. I have picked at the MT5 a little bit though and can tell it's gonna be much more difficult than the NW4. There is much more going on in the MT5 and I'm having to switch between the sliders and pins. The MT5 feels much more crowded making the pins/sliders harder to access and easier to accidentally bump something you already set. In the NW4 once something was set it stayed set. Hopefully I'll have the MT5 open soon but I also got some Marks High Security/Scorpion CX5 locks arriving soon and I'm really looking forward to working on those.

The Desmo was a lot of fun to pick. When I first tried to pick it I didn't use a light and struggled so much I thought I would never get it open. But after today I realized it really wasn't that hard. And being able to put the light under the tension wrench made it significantly easier. Lockpickinglawyer has a great "How to" video on picking it. The lock gives good feedback and his video explains how to tell if a slider is in a true or false gate.

I could never find them at a decent price either, so I eventually just had to cough up the $90 at SecuritySnobs. Even though it was overpriced I really like the little lock. I still keep my eye open for them. Currently there is a listing on ebay for 11 Desmo payphone locks for $149 OBO. Not sure if i'm allowed to post the link but the title of the listing is "11 Assa Payphone Lower Locks keyed alike for GTE Palco Quadrum Payphones Protel" . Comes out to about $14 a piece but I doubt you want 11 of them.

Thanks,
GGL

[adi_picker]

I found those Desmo locks you mentioned greengrow, quite a steal really, but only the one key :/ I looked around for some way to dupe it, with the intention of being able to distribute them around the community, but no luck.

S&G 7 Lever



More levers inside this lock than I could poke a stick at! But not a pick! I used a Prybar and a Gem to open this one.

Sargent Keso



In the above image, you can see where I drilled the dimple that retains the outer cover and hence the springs and pins, and replaced it with a little grub screw. Dont know why I continue to want to monkey around inside these dimple locks, I always end up regretting it, and putting it aside to be re-assembled some months later when I have the time. I had intended to take some gut shots for everyone, but it never eventuated, as I wanted to get it back together so I could pick it, given my recent success with other dimples.

adi_picker

[adi_picker]

And another!

This is an 8 pin radial dimple lock from a car steering wheel lockout, like a ClubLock or such. 2 pins stacked vertically at each 1.30, 4.30, 7.30 and 10.30.





In this lock the centre post remains static while the middle ring rotates around it. To tension it I made a custom tubular lock style tension tool to fit.

adi_picker

[adi_picker]

ALC Galaxy

Finally got my hands on one of these. Sans key, but do we really need one?



The circular ring you can see in the plug is the tool I made to tension it. You cannot tension this lock from the part you see, this is only a cap, and this is why the tool is nessacery. Also, like most other tubular locks, to fully open it, it requires several pickings at each pin position around the plug. This is why the tool is in the photo, as it becomes trapped during picking, due to the fact that only the topmost groove on the facecap is large enough to accept the tensioning key.



As you can see, I made a couple of tools for this lock. The tensioning tool, which tensions what the ALC literature refer to as the 'rotor', and an alingment tool to set the codebar in position either Left, Centre or Right. Was fun making the tools, but the lock itself is not much of a challenge. Once you have the tension in the correct spot, they are really no harder than a regular tubular lock, once you get the feel of the pins, or 'carriage bars' as ALC call them. You can see the patent and get more info on this lock here.

adi_picker

[peterwn]

I had thought there were false shallow depressions in the coding bar to make picking more difficult. If there was one false depression per tumbler there would be 32 ways the tumblers could be set by picking with only one being 'correct'. Possibly a skilled picker would identify a 'false' as distinct from a 'true' position.
The objectives of this type of cylinder would be to facilitate grand masterkeying and to facilitate re-keying if a masterkey goes missing since it can be re-keyed at masterkey level while retaining the same change key. It can be re-keyed without removing the cylinder - only the code bar needs to be removed and replaced. Since re-keying requires a new blank code bar, the maker benefits from each re-key through the profit margin on the code bars. Temporary code bars can be used for construction keying then reused on a subsequent project.
It would be interesting to know where these locks have actually been used. The main end uses would seem to be universities and large office or apartment blocks where extensive masterkeying is required but electronic security cannot be justified for most doors.
The same firm manufactures Bilock. Except for broaching slots (5 for this lock or two for Bilock) the cylinder shells would be equal for both types - an important consideration since the firm manufactures a wide range of cylinder types (round mortice, Euro, Australian oval, nightlatch, cam, Schlage and other key in knob, etc, etc).

[adi_picker]

Gday Peter,

There were some false gates in the codebar. During my first couple of attempts at picking it, I think I did run into them and this prevented me from opening it. After a little practice though, I got a tension level that worked well and I didn't feel them anymore. When I was picking it with the right tension, I would get resistance until I was in a true gate. As soon as I felt the loss of resistance I would stop and move onto the next pin. With this method, I haven't failed to pick it yet, both CW and CCW (opening, and returning the tool for removal), and with the sidebar in its various positions. Also, when I was first picking it, I hadn't made the codebar setting tool yet, so I think I may have had the codebar misaligned on some attempts, meaning there was no gates to set into.

I have seen these in the wild in a few different places. Once was a large shire on the outskirts of Sydney, another an airport, and the third I believe was on NBN cabinets on the east coast of Australia. I have also seen the NBN cabinets in Perth where I reside, but these seem to be a standard Yale type over here. I suspect that these locks would be rather expensive, even when buying a full system, if only because of all the equipment required to be purchased, or leased AFAIK in the case of the Galaxy, including the codebar machine which has multiple cutting heads, and runs a full PC with an embedded version of Windows XP! I know for a fact that BiLock dealers pay upwards of $10000 AUD for their cutting and bending tools, and these are simply well engineered hand tools! I personally think that ALCOs tooling prices are way to high, but the machines they produce are super precise, and its the price you pay for enginnering and manufacturing in Australia instead of overseas I guess.

As for the broaching, I did pull this cylinder apart to take a peek after I had it picked. It did require destructive entry, as the faceplate is retained by a ring that is set into a groove in the housing, so I had to remove all the material in front of it. I managed to remove enough to get the faceplate off, but left enough to put it back on, so I can still use it The housing is indeed nearly identical to the BiLock in this case, but with the 5 sidebar grooves instead of the 2 in the BL. I did take pictures of the internals, but they turned out average, and a little blurry, so I may or may not bother to place them up.

For those that havent seen it, here is an ALCO video of the Galaxy system.

adi_picker

[peterwn]

What I meant by 'broaching' was the method used to make the sidebar grooves. Presumably the tool used would be a rod with same diameter as the plug with two or five cutters protruding from it which would be forced through the cylinder shell.
Seems surprising they are used for NBN cabinets since there would be little if any masterkeying complexity. Perhaps the utility was talked into purchasing them on the basis they could be re-keyed readily - locksmith looks for some easy customers to sell the system to - to help recoup costs.
I was in Hawaii last year - power utility used WB padlocks which makes sense, while the communications utility used Best padlocks for pole mounted cabinets and it would seem unlikely that the cores would ever be changed during the life cycle of the padlocks - heavens knows why they used Best. Similar situation to using Galaxy on NBN cabinets.

[adi_picker]

Sorry Pete,

I did understand you meaning of broaching, but I think I may have relayed it back incorrectly. The cylinder, which the plug fits into is indeed identical to the BiLock. In the case of this lock, the cylinder used in the Master Padlock was the same as BiLock ones I have that were used in Lockwood 334s. The broaching is 5 cutouts in the cylinder to accommodate the 5 carriage bars of the Galaxy as opposed to 2 cutouts in the BiLock to accommodate the 2 sidebars.

Indeed it is strange what companies / utilities are talked into in regards to their lock choices. And I think that's exactly what it is. Over here in WA all our major utilities use BiLock stuff for the most part, and even for simple things like pole cabinets and gates. The price for their systems must be astronomical, and its a case where a simple 5 pin padlock would have provided the same level of security, given that if someone wants to bypass a gate outdoors, they are likely to just cut the chain. I can understand the use of high sec on buildings and such, where the entry / door has inherently more security than a chain, but for anything that's padlocked, I really don't get it. All the locks are usually also IC core, when they are unlikely to ever rekey, and if they do, due to the elements outdoors, the whole padlock is likely to be replaced as unservicable anyway. The locksmiths involved must be good salesmen

adi_picker

[greengrowlocks]

It's been nearly two weeks and about an hour a day working on this lock but finally today I got it open. Along the journey I learned quite a lot about picking it and also made a number of slider picks as well. In the end I just used some modified Goso picks which worked great. I hope that some of the knowledge will translate over to the WSW which I plan to open next. The WSW is similar in design with 6 top pins, 5 left sliders, 2 right sliders and a slightly more restrictive keyway.

Evva ICS (3 pins, 10 sliders)

[adi_picker]

Nice picking on the ICS greengrow, you're really starting to slay the high security stuff mate!

Bilock 2nd Gen QCC!



One side SPPed, and the second raked. Starting to get a feel for these now, although some are definately more difficult than others depending on the amount of mastering. This one I would rate as a medium, being that only some of the pins are mastered. You can see some of the brass filings I created when I raked the second side!

adi_picker

[Silverado]

Yinz are doing some amazing work here! I am hoping to get some of the higher security locks eventually and give them a shot.