How did I? I took the removeable core out and handed it to my friend, then I told him to push the shackle in. Then I looked away. I turned in time to see the shackle and big spring to springing onto the carpet of sixth hour. From what I can understand, the shackle was pushed in without aligning the other part of the shackle so it would go in the other hole, the force pushed on the ball holding the shackle in, which in turn pinched the piece that locked both of the balls, and since there was no core to keep it in place, it just pinched out the bottom hole. That left space for both balls to collapse into the newly formed hole at the center, which in turn released the shackle, and the spring that was constantly pushing the shackle up acted like a nice mechanism to propel the lone shackle out of the body. Of course, the spring followed suit. Now...the only thing I can't understand is where the small spring was in all of this. If you look at the center piece that pushed the balls out, one indent is larger then the other one. The smaller indent won't let the ball that holds the always-in side of the shackle to go intirely into the lock, so it's still sticking out into the shackle's hole a little and not letting me push the shackle back in.
It's hard to explain, so I'm sorry for the poor description. I think the next thing to do is to try and find an allen wrench that can loosen the screw on the bottom of the shackle, that will maybe allow the metal to squeeze just that last bit and allow me to push it back into its hole. Then I can reach the allen wrench up through the hole in the bottom, through the middle of the spring, and tighten the shackle's screw once it's back in one piece.
I have sure learned a lot about the workings of this lock though.