FREE STUFF CONTEST .....

[keysman]

Ok thanks for the suggestions.....



I have a total of 5 hammers ( yes, there were a few boxes with 2 in them)

So here is the deal:

3 categories 1 hammer to be awarded per category . 2 hammers awarded for “ special reasons “to be determined at a later date.

Please read the ‘rules” below .

Ok lets have some FUN !


# 1.The best story about How you helped someone or something with your lock picking/ locksmithing skills.. doesn’t have to be true…. just a good story


#2.The most interesting story about THE WORST THING you have ever done using your lock pick/ locksmith skills. Again doesn’t have to be true but, suggestion of felonies ( in the USA) will be reason to be disqualified.

#3.The absolute STUPIDEST Customer you have come across ( again fiction is acceptable)


Rules:

1. You can enter as many times as you like in any category.
2. Please keep your stories CLEAN.. we have minors and “sensitive” people here.
3.Winners will be determined by the number of positive comments posted.
3a.Please keep negative comments about other contestants/ contributions to 1 post

4. Prizes winners will be announced early AM Sunday Dec 3, 2006 ( Las Vegas time)
5. All decisions of the judge ( me ) will be final. No exceptions
6. Postage will be taken care of by the judge ( me )


IM me with any questions

Thanks

[Raccoon]

I'll withdraw my entry since I already have one of these. I would weave some good fiction but I already have a bit of creative writing I want to finish first.

As far as stupidest customer; It's a tossup between a customer whose family thought they'd save her $35 by causing $500~$1200 in damages by wedging her doors open with a block of wood and jamming THREE (3) coat hangers and a copper pipe to try and push the unlock buttons on either side. After denting the door frames, scratching the paint and interior door panels and console, and shredding the weather stripping, they finally allowed her to call me. The vehicle was a brand new black chevy pickup.
Or perhaps the guy who first needed a ride to his car, then wanted me to break into it without any form of identification. He was shocked that I refused, and angered that I dare ask for his driver's license, as this was somehow harassment against his nationality. His only defense was "but it's my car, you already have my permission to open it."

Anyway, good luck to the contestants!

[arris]

errm,

ill try keep it true,

how i helped someone, does it count if it was me?

when i first started my apprentiship, i had been picking already, and they didnt know i could actually pick,
1st task i got set was to cut a safe key by hand to a lock, so he showed me the basics took the safe key and put it in the keycabinet, and left me to it,

so i looked at the cabinet and it only being a single sided wafer cam lock, i found a few odd picks lying about and thaught id try my luck, and got it open, got the key out and copyed it, then told the guy i had done it by hand, he was amazed how well it worked

later on he found out i cheated, but was impressed i could pick better than him

ill have to think of the other one tho

[Genesis]

The single worst thing I've ever done was actually quite funny after I look back on it. But first alittle background info, I have always been facinated by lockpicking and ass a child would pretend I was picking our house locks with paper clips or other things. Well at the age of about 11 or 12 I had figured out how locks actually worked but still figured you could do it with paper clips. One day (when I was about 12) while staying with my grandmother at her business I was sitting at my aunts desk (because she was out to lunch) and again I was playing and picked a wafer lock on my aunts desk with a paper clip and a pair of scissors, though I was smart enough to open the drawer before picking it, well she never used the lock and they didn't have the key to it and I had just locked it and didn't know what to do. I finally ended up getting a dremel and cutting the lever off the back because of the close quarters I couldn't unscrew the back.And at the time I was really into painting miniatures and did World War II Dioramas so I had my paints with me and custom mixed up some paint and matched the coor of the desk and painted over all the paint scratches I had made while fiddling with the lock. Well I finally got it all fixed and just removed the locking mech and had it looking exactly like it was before she left for lunch. I did this all in about 45 minutes and to this day she still hasn't realized that that lock is nothing more than a dummy lock and that I did that. I'm 18 now so it would be about 6 years ago that that happened. The funny thing to me is now that I look back on it was my feelings on one hand I was on cloud 9 because I actually picked a lock (it didn't matter that it was only like a 2 or 3 pin wafer lock) then on the other hand I was thinking "oh crap I'm going to be in sooo much trouble" haha oh well thats my story hope you enjoyed it.

[What]

hmm, worst thing i have done....that is true.....

well my best friend loses stuff/forgets stuff all the time and so he accidentally locked himself out of his room(simple KIK cylinder) and so i got him in, he then found that he had lost the key so being the amazing friend i am i offered to repin it to any key that he gave me. next day he comes by my house and leaves the lock and the new key on the porch, i found it, rekeyed and master keyed his lock(so my key would work too) and then took it to his house and installed it.

so a couple weeks get by and he loses his key again(i threatened to attach the key to him permanently), so i go over and just use my key to get in, he is in utter disbelief and got a bit pissed until he thought about it some, he loses his keys a lot, so give me a key!

well, i really dont use my picks to do much of anything bad, just practical jokes on my friends....

[Romstar]

Category 1: The best thing I think I have done.

I posted this before, but I still think this qualifies as one of the best things I have ever done with my picking skills, and it still tops the list. I did this at a moments notice with only a small set I kept in the car at the time.

My great uncle had fallen in his den. The door was locked, and he had the only key to the door in his pocket.

Everyone was outside the door considering using a very large vase pedestal to batter in the door. Considering that the door was solid oak, I didn't think that was very likely.

I went out to the car, got my picks and went to work.

It felt like an hour in front of that lock. My eyes unfocused, my great aunt almost in hysterics, and the sound of my great uncle obviously in pain on the other side of the door.

I was told later that it took me about 60 seconds to open that lock. High security Yale with mushroom and spool drivers, and serrated bottom pins. He'd had a locksmith install it when the safe was installed.

Turns out he'd had a mild heart attack and could not get back up. An abulance arrived not long after and took him to the hospital.

For me, that was the best.
It wasn't for pay, it wasn't someone forgetting their keys in the house, it could have been a life. It was a day before it really sank in about what I had done.

I think that is it.
Romstar

[Romstar]

This falls into category 3, but the funny part is its a bad cutomer and a good cutomer pair. Read, and you will see.........

On the topic of bone heads, I would have to say that an auto opening comes immediately to mind.

Its something like 6:30 in the morning, and I get a call from a lovely lady in New Minas. A community not far from where I live, maybe twenty minutes up the highway. She wants to know if I can come and open her car for her.

No problem I say, and tell her the rate is $45.00. She agrees, and gives me the basics on the car. Turns out is an older Ford Mustang. One of the late 80s early 90s jobs if memory serves. Nothing too fancy, and not a collectors item.

So, off I go and head off for the job.

6:55 am I arrive in the driveway of a nice middle class home in a decent subdivision........Thats all thats normal. Its pretty easy to identify the car. Not because it matches the make, colour and model, but because there is an obviously agitaged man standing beside the drivers door in his boxers an undershirt and a pair of sandles. This isn't the worst of it though.

There are 5 coat hangers in the drivers door, and four in the passenger's door. Or at least I thought it was four. Turns out later that one of them is the antenna from the car. Thats right, the antenna. It seems that the coat hangers were bending, and this fellow thought the stiffer antenna may work better.

So I am at a bit of a loss now. I mean, here I am, all ready with my tools to simply pop open a door, collect my $45.00 and send the nice lady on her way. Now I have an irate and irritated half dressed man standing beside the car while his lovely wofe looks on from the front steps.

There is NO WAY I am sticking anything in a door after this mess.

Buddy looks at me, and says, "So you think you can get this thing open BOY?" Now, I realize I am not the oldest guy around, but I really hate being called BOY, especially by anyone who isn't obviously twenty years or more older than I am, and at 7:00 in the morning to boot.

I screw on the best smile I can, and I look at him and his wife, and I say, "I sure can, no problem". By theis point the only thing I can think of is picking the lock, because after all those coat hangers I have no idea what he's busted.

I take a walk over to the passenger door, take out the pick set, and go to work. The bloody thing opens after something like 30 seconds. Its one of the fastest picking jobs I have ever done on a car. I cover this up and pretend to pick for a while more whil listening to the man rant about how I won't get it, and he's been trying all morning, etc., etc.. I reach down, lift the handle and miraculously the door actually opens. He hasn't torn off the linkages. I sit down in the seat, take the keys from the ignition and am about to get out and give the obviously female keychain (Its got a plush kitten on the ring) to the nice lady who hasn't said much all this time.

It starts getting bad at this point. The lady starts to say thank you, and the man looks like somebody gave him a low blow, and then he starts sputtering. I'm feeling kinda good about the whole thing until he starts in about not paying me $45.00 for a minute of work.

I try to explain that its the knowledge, and the trip that he actually paying for and all that jazz. He ain't taking it. He don't think he should pay for two minutes worth of work.

Fine, no problem I say. I toss the keys on the seat, lock the door and close it. Have a nice day.

He starts sputtering again, and he says he'll pay for the opening.

"Well, there is a bit of a problem sir, now I have to open it again, and the cost will be $80.00"

His sputtering and hollering at this point is waking up the neighbors. I go over to the wife, give her my card and tell her to call me when she has her husband under control and the fee will still only be $45.00. She says that would be great, and she will call me back in a few minutes.

In the meantime, I go down the hill to my favorite Tim Horton's (I'm in New Minas a LOT) and order a coffee and Bagel.

Thirty minutes go by, and my phone hasn't rung yet. I am beginning to get worried when I happen to look up, and driving past me is a Ford Mustang with a broken rear window, and several coat hangers sticking out of the doors.

The nice lady calls me twenty minutes after that and tells me what happened. He husband was so pissed off he picked up a hammer, broke the window and opened the door. She wants to know if I can fix the mess.

I tell her I don't normally do glass, but I would be happy to help her out. I make a few calls, and get back to her. I tell her what three other glass places have told me, and then I tell her I can get her a second hand window, and the price for taking out the coat hangers and putting in the window for her. It saves her over $300.00, and I make $300.00. I get the glass, and the material, meet her at her work, tear out two door skins, remove a pile of bent coat hangers, repair some pulled wires, and one broken linkage in the drivers door, and replace the window.

I get a $50.00 tip, and a hug and kiss from a really pretty lady. I manage to hand out my cards to 12 lawyers and a few office clerks and over all have a pretty good morning. She's two steps away from beating her husband with a coat hanger but tells me he just gets wound up sometimes. He actually a really nice guy.

Apparently she even told him that I would come back for only $45.00 and he STILL broke the wondiow. Some people just never understand.

Romstar

[n2oah]

I choose #2.
(this is true)
There was a highway in construction this summer, and I was riding down it one summer night. I was about 3 miles out when I felt an intense need to go to the bathroom. Well, a porta-potty was right near me, so I went in and did what I needed to do. Unfortuantely, there was no toilet paper. In there was one of those tp dispensers where you need to unlock a lock and manually change the roll. The lock was a small Abus that I easily unlocked with my pick set that I was carrying. I changed the roll, re-locked the lock, finished up, and then I was on my way.

[Krypos]

this is true. if ya want clarification, i actually posted this story a while ago.

i have a neighbor, she is like, 49, but very nice, she has a ford taurus, and one day my lil brother comes running in and tells me this nice neighbor has somehow broken her key off in her cars trunk. so i grab my picks, head out and see whats going on, having been on the forums here for like, oh i wanna say about 4 months maybe. so i tell her i might be able to help her. i check out the lock, sure enough, her key snapped real nice and deep in there. so i pulled out my SO broken key extractor and began the tedious work of trial and error (this was my first time using the key extractor in a real situation, and my first time using ANY tool in car locks). the curtain on the lock was causing some trouble, but after a difficult 2 minutes i finally gently pulled that bad boy right out and handed it to her. she was VERY happy, i had saved her at least $200 because she would have had to taken it into the ford dealership and had them replace it..... not fun for her. she was so glad, she looked like she wanted to kiss me, gross, as shes my moms age, but she was just that happy. now she only had to get a new key. she thanked me a bunch and then i got to act all cool in front of like, 4 neighbors and take my leave and go back inside and post it here.

all true story. and obviously a good story, so its for category number one.

what do you all think?

[LockNewbie21]

Just Keep it short and sweet.

There was and old man three house down across the street from my Uncle.

I opened his lock, and he offered money I turned it down, and was glad because when we offered him a jacket he said he survived pearl harbor.

I said that in another thread, but honestly probobly the best feeling man, 80 year old still kicking it and i got to help him.

Its not the best but made me feel like a good person. Good luck guys, sweet bump hammer.

[keysman]

GOOD stories Keep 'em comming


You guys have inspired me to write a few of my own stories!

[maxxed]

I had a call from a guy who had locked himself out of his garage, and when I told him what the charge would be he said that he could smash the lock and replace it for that much. I told him that is correct, my fee is about the same as a replacement lock. He then told me he would rather take care of things himself. A couple of hours later he phoned back and asked if I would come out for the same fee. I had imagined that he had a half destroyed door and lock but I found out that he had successfully entered the garage, replaced the lock, and locked himself out again

[Krypos]

I had a call from a guy who had locked himself out of his garage, and when I told him what the charge would be he said that he could smash the lock and replace it for that much. I told him that is correct, my fee is about the same as a replacement lock. He then told me he would rather take care of things himself. A couple of hours later he phoned back and asked if I would come out for the same fee. I had imagined that he had a half destroyed door and lock but I found out that he had successfully entered the garage, replaced the lock, and locked himself out again

you have got to be <road apples> me!

[maxxed]

This is true but is not my story.A lady had locked herself out of her car and had called a locksmith to open the car. When he arrived she showed him the remote with a key hanging beside it, he took the key and used it to open the door. Apparently she had always used the remote to unlock the car and it did not occur to her to use the key

[maxxed]

you have got to be <road apples> me!

That really happened