List of Lock Picking Materials

[salvage]

So I was looking through the forums, and although I found several threads with good ideas on materials to make picks/tension tools out of, I didn't find a thread dedicated to possibilities for this. I'm pretty new to all of this, as I made my first set two days ago from stamped (not flat ) hanging file folder hooks, and then yesterday I made my second pair from the hook from another folder I found that had a flat hook/bar thing. Thanks much to raimundo for the design of these; I made the bogota style picks, with the exception that I made the half diamond pick a hook. The other thing is that I strongly recommend against using the stamped metal kind of hanging file folder hooks, since the curves in the material and the thinness make them really easy to bend. The flat hook is great so far, though.

Anyways, onto the main point - some materials that I dug up out of the threads:

Pick materials
-street sweeper bristle
-brick strap
-bike spoke
-hanging folder file (although to make bogotas, you need to cut it down to half it's width, since it is initially 1/8 of an inch)
-bobby pin
-car wiper insert
-auto feeler gauge
-drain snake
-carpenter scrapers (thin sheets of metal used to finish wood)
-hacksaw/bandsaw blades
-junior hacksaw blades


Tension wrench
-many of the above used for a pick will work for a wrench
-8-penny aluminum nail, hammered flat
-allen wrench

It would be great if other people could post other materials that have worked well for them, or advice on which of these materials have worked/not worked for them and why.

[!*AMP*!]

I made a pick out of a coat hanger...hammered the tip flat, and hand filed it into a shallow hook. Then added a small half bend at the back to make it more ergonomical on the hand...has a nice feel to it. Although, I would suggest using something else than a coathanger...it just took a little too long.

[Kaotik]

Most of the materials listed above work very well. My favorites are Street Sweeper Bristles, Hacksaw Blades and the two different sizes of Windscreen spines/inserts.

I dont make tension tools out of Hacksaw blades due to i'ts thin britle nature, but I make those out of the SS Bristles, Windscreen spines and the occasional good quality Butter knife cut to the width of 1/8" the re-temper it for strength.

[salvage]

Sorry, but what are windscreen spines? Could you post a link to a picture or something?

(Yes, I'm guessing they are spines in a windscreen, but if we're thinking the same thing, then windscreens are made of wires too thin to be good for picks, I would think)

[UWSDWF]

windshield wiper inserts

[!*AMP*!]

There you go...maybe windscreen confused the guy, hehe...over here us Yanks call it a windshield. But no biggie...I plan on ripping one off of a vehicle here soon...but only when I have the replacement to put back on...which it has been needing to be replaced soon anyway.

[toiletplumber]

can you post a picture of the drain snake you used? All I saw at the hardware store was a long wire and it wasn't flat. I think it was called a drain auger. The other thing i found was sort of flat but it was thicker than molases.

[Kaotik]

Glad someone cleared that up...LoL. If salvage would have filled out his profile completely, I would have known what name to use that he could relate to.

*Winshield Wiper Inserts* there you go, I just wanted to put this in there again.

[mrdan]

For Tention Wrench, I used a small peice from my fishtape (electrician) I thinned it with a dremmel. I bent a small "L" in the end, works great!

For the pick so far I have used a very thick paperclip (quite stiff for a paperclip) bent into a snake shape and dremmeled flat. This works pretty good too. (surprisingly)

My latest project is a butter knife (again with the Dremmel cut real thin and I am currently in the process of shaping it (haven't chosen exact design yet)

[Kaotik]

For Tention Wrench, I used a small peice from my fishtape (electrician) I thinned it with a dremmel. I bent a small "L" in the end, works great!

For the pick so far I have used a very thick paperclip (quite stiff for a paperclip) bent into a snake shape and dremmeled flat. This works pretty good too. (surprisingly)

My latest project is a butter knife (again with the Dremmel cut real thin and I am currently in the process of shaping it (haven't chosen exact design yet)

Are you making a pick of T/Wrench out of this B/Knife? IMHO they work better for Wrenches than picks. Unless, it happens to be thin enough to slide fully to the back of the lock. I say this because some B/Knives start out pretty thin at the tip but widen more towards the handle area.

Jason13 made some picks out of B/Knives, I remember seeing something of that nature in a thread, can't remember where, you may ask him how they turned out and which ones he used and what picks he made from them or search "homemade picks" or "homebrew picks".

There will be tons of reference pics in one/both of those searches, that should help you with some ideas on designs.

[!*AMP*!]

Glad someone cleared that up...LoL. If salvage would have filled out his profile completely, I would have known what name to use that he could relate to.

*Winshield Wiper Inserts* there you go, I just wanted to put this in there again.

It's always funny when those types of things happen on here,LOL

[unbreakable]

For Tention Wrench, I used a small peice from my fishtape (electrician) I thinned it with a dremmel. I bent a small "L" in the end, works great!

For the pick so far I have used a very thick paperclip (quite stiff for a paperclip) bent into a snake shape and dremmeled flat. This works pretty good too. (surprisingly)

My latest project is a butter knife (again with the Dremmel cut real thin and I am currently in the process of shaping it (haven't chosen exact design yet)

Are you making a pick of T/Wrench out of this B/Knife? IMHO they work better for Wrenches than picks. Unless, it happens to be thin enough to slide fully to the back of the lock. I say this because some B/Knives start out pretty thin at the tip but widen more towards the handle area.

Jason13 made some picks out of B/Knives, I remember seeing something of that nature in a thread, can't remember where, you may ask him how they turned out and which ones he used and what picks he made from them or search "homemade picks" or "homebrew picks".

There will be tons of reference pics in one/both of those searches, that should help you with some ideas on designs.

Look for another post where someone cutup a buthchers knife to make picks.

Apparantely, he got a lot of picks out of it, but it must have been a thinner butchers knife then I know, cause the butchers knife I know is too thick to fit in a keyway.

[Kaotik]

unbreakable,

Good thing it wasn't a meat clever, I would have loved to see the work put into that to get to fit into a lock.

[LockNewbie21]

Might have been a filet knife, thre thinner and very flexable

[unbreakable]

Like I said, it was meat cleaver size, but much thinner.