Science Fair project help?

[nickfish03]

Right, so I am trying to do something revolving around lockpicking for my science fair project. What I need right now is some way to be able to measure the amount of torque when either manual or mechanical picking. What I have thought of lately is to take a torque wrench and grinding the end bit of an extension for the wrench. I am not sure if this will work because I think that the wrench wouldn't be sensitive enough to be able to use for lockpicking. I am not doing the actual project right now but I do have to get the procedures ready and stuf pretty soon. Soo, if anyone has any suggestions on how to measure torque easily and effectively it would be much appreciated if you would post. Thanks guys

[sams choice]

http://www.lockpickshop.com/p-TNT-2.html

That should be a huge help for your project. I would recommend find searching for one that is a bit of a reasonable price. I could look for you, but hey, it is part of the project to research. [/list]

[pick_maker]

nick, I'm curious, what kind of questions do you think the judge will ask?

[What]

or you could run a linkage of some kind from the rear of a cylindar.

and then attach that to a small scale.

tada!

you can measure the amount of tension.

[Shrub]

'What' has it almost spot on,

You get a small balence scale from your local fishing tackle shop, head shop or spices shop and fasten it onto the end of the wrench, you then apply tension by pulling the other end of the scale to read what poundage (or other measurement) you are excerting on the wrench,

You may need to work out fulcrums and the length of the wrench etc to get a rotational force on the central axis but personally i would use a certain wrench length as the standard as in 'on a 4 inch wrench the force required is....'

[clayton1123]

alright, try paper macheing a giant lock with pins and a cardboard key. Make it a cut away lock

[Chucklz]

I would suggest a strain gauge (actually 2 of them).
http://zone.ni.com/devzone/conceptd.nsf ... enDocument

Just have them on the tension wrench to an a/d converter, then collect data on the computer port of your choice. Use a few small masses to make a calibration curve relating strain to torque and there you go.

[Bahrg]

head shop

I havent heard that term for many years now, throws me back to the 80s Just how old are u Shrub? Erm unless its still in common usage in the UK.

[Treeson]

head shop

I havent heard that term for many years now, throws me back to the 80s Just how old are u Shrub? Erm unless its still in common usage in the UK.

'

So... I take it 'head shop' is not a commonly used term in Canada? That's rather interesting to me because I live on an island and am only 16 years old but am rather familiar with this usage. Not only me and fellow 'islanders', but I know many people from different parts of the country who call places like this head shops.

On the topic of head shops... Has anyone here been to Key West?


*/Treeson drools over 6 foot high hookah's\*

[Shrub]

Well it is still used in the UK i think but i am going back a few years since i was in one over here

[nickfish03]

Wow, I thank all you guys for such quick responses and quite a few (even if a few are a bit off topic). I had thought of the scale idea but haven't gone into it much yet. I will look into all of your suggestions. Now if you would like another little challenge how bout a question. I am using both topic possiblities (I am still in the planning stage) for manual and mechanical lockpicking. So now that I have some ideas for torque how bout a question I can base my experiment on? I'm not going to use your questions exactly if at all but I'm just wondering what you guys have to say/are thinking about. Also, my mom thinks that it needs to have more of a real world connection so if you want to help prove her wrong go ahead and post. She is saying that it needs something more like fishing, how people use it to get food and how it would be IMPORTANT in life. A few objections I had was that manufacturers could make a more pick-resistant lock, modern locksmithing of course and I didn't have much else. So what do you guys think to make it more important in life. (Sorry if a bit of that is confusing...)

[What]

one thing i just realized,

when putting tension on the plug we are using it to bind pins,

but, the tension is not measureable b/c the plug is binding the pins.

soo, there is no true way to measure the amount of tension being applied.

[Gundanium]

You could show a snap gun and how it works, how it creates momentium that transfers through the bottom pins to the top pins creating a break in the shearline.

THat seems like a very good science project topic, or should probably be included.

compare it to like pool balls or newtans cradle or something like that.

[What]

to explain my earlier point,

[nickfish03]

If I am going to pick anything I would think I would have to measure the torque. Because witout it I wouldn't be able to pick the lock. Without picking the lock i can't do an expirement on it. I was thinking about the snap pick idea. I would have liked to do it using a pick gun (a nice excuse to get one too) but the problem is it would not be legal to ship it to my house, not sure if this has to do with anything but I am under the age of 18, I could try to get one of the local lock smiths order me one for the project but I have no idea what the outcome would be, i might be able to have a car merchant order me one (my mom knows the merchant) but i'd rather not. I don't really want to use a snap pick but if I had to use it i suppose I could. Also pick_maker to answer you question I'm pretty sure there won't be a judge besides my teacher for the class, its a requirement for school and is hosted by the school. I looked at quite a few this year and we just went around looking at the boards.