Padlock types

[stilte]

To start things off, I just want to say that I picked my first lock an hour ago. Oh the feeling was great! It was a 4-pin cylinder padlock.

When I did the last pin in and felt the wrench moving, I thought "Oh. My. God." And then when the shackle popped up, I shouted "Holy SHIT!" The blood went out of my hands and shiver went up my spine. For the next few minutes, I sat there with a huge grin repeating "f%$& yeah!" again and again and i'm a person who hardly ever swears!

Just thinking about that makes me smile again! Two big thank yous to lp101 and the MIT guide.

Anyway, back to my questions.
- Why do laminated steel padlocks look like they're made out of bundles of wire?
- Is the lamination meant for resistance to corrosion?
- Doesn't brass work just as well?
- What purpose do the bumps on the padlock serve?

[Delta]

To start things off, I just want to say that I picked my first lock an hour ago. Oh the feeling was great! It was a 4-pin cylinder padlock.

When I did the last pin in and felt the wrench moving, I thought "Oh. My. God." And then when the shackle popped up, I shouted "Holy road apples!" The blood went out of my hands and shiver went up my spine. For the next few minutes, I sat there with a huge grin repeating "f%$& yeah!" again and again and i'm a person who hardly ever swears!

Just thinking about that makes me smile again! Two big thank yous to lp101 and the MIT guide.

Anyway, back to my questions.
- Why do laminated steel padlocks look like they're made out of bundles of wire?
- Is the lamination meant for resistance to corrosion?
- Doesn't brass work just as well?
- What purpose do the bumps on the padlock serve?

Congratulations!

To answer your questions:

Laminated steel padlocks are just plates of steel bolted together, if you look at the bottom of your padlock at the plate and then look beyond the first plate you will find that the other plates are very similar, although they vary in shape as there is the cylinder, locking dogs, springs, shackle etc in there.

I'm not too sure on the corrosion question, i always thought it was whole lot cheaper to make and brass seems to be a little worse than the laminated steel padlocks when it comes to corrosion, so you could be correct.

The bumps will be the tops and bottoms of the pins that keep the steel plates together.

[stilte]

Thanks for the quick reply. Took another look at the lock and yeah looks about right for the plates.

And on a side note, I noticed my post got censored a little. Hmm... I didn't think holy "poop" was considered vulgar. Oh well.

[raimundo]

the site has an automatic filter to make it harder for the flamers, and the laminated padlocks are made by banging out lamininations on a punch press, the steel is maybe slightly stronger than brass which most other cheap padlocks are made of, but basicly its a cheap process to automate and the steel is cheaper than brass

[quickpicks]

The bumps will be the tops and bottoms of the pins that keep the steel plates together

This is true but if you examine some of the cheaper laminates ML makes, such as the number 3, usually 2 of the rivots are fake.

Correct me if I am wrong.

[VashTSPD]

The bumps will be the tops and bottoms of the pins that keep the steel plates together

This is true but if you examine some of the cheaper laminates ML makes, such as the number 3, usually 2 of the rivots are fake.

Correct me if I am wrong.

I've taken apart a few laminated padlocks, one looked like it had three rods on each side, but the middle rod on both sides was fake, and another looked like it had four rods on each side...and it did. what a bugger to hack off

'looks like 6 rods' means it had six rivots on the side.