Ingersoll 'Impregnable'.

[Mad Mick]

I'm looking for some tips on picking this lock I have been given, which if successful, will net me some Abloy padlocks. Now to the story:

I have been looking at some Abloy's at work since I got into picking and have been dying to have a go but, since they aren't mine (yet!), I've not touched them. I asked the boss what he was doing with them and the reply was "Nothing".

I asked if I could have them.

He said "Why?"

I answered "For picking practice." (he knows me very well)

He said "If you can open these, you can have the others", and handed me a Master No5 & an Ingersoll 'Impregnable'.

The Master was popped in about 30 seconds....
The Ingersoll....still trying! (guess he's smarter than he looks)

Upon examination, the lock is a laminated steel body with a shrouded shackle and appears to be a double wafer, with the exception being that the wafers aren't typical of a double wafer lock - more like a 1/2 wafer top & bottom. The keyway is a little restrictive (not particularly warded, but tension wrench placement is not ideal) hence my making a custom wishbone - I REALLY want the Abloys....

The plug turns (under a little resistance) about 10 degrees before coming to a stop. I've had a quick try at raking with the J1 pick from my LT-620 pick set, and can get about 5 wafers unsetting when tension is released, but no more than that. Before I spend much more time on it, I wondered if any of the other Brits, or anyone else for that matter, had any experience with this lock:

Did a quick Google search on this lock and didn't find much, but this excerpt was taken from - http://www.textfiles.com/anarchy/LOCKPI ... seclox.txt

Ingersoll

(UK) ING1 10-lever, double-sided (4-5)

Ingersoll "impregnable" locks have a W-shaped keyway flanked by what appear to
be ordinary wafer tumblers. The key is double-sided with non-symmetric cuts
that are staggered from top to bottom. The wafers drive semi-circular levers
arranged around the plug. Each of the ten wafers must be raised so that the
levers are flush with the plug, allowing it to turn. The rotation of the plug
is heavily damped, so that very little vibration feeds back to the picker
while tensioning the lock. Ingersoll padlocks are extremely large and rugged,
with a suitably thick, ball-locking shackle.

A local locksmith once told me that an expert lock picker took 3 hours to
pick one of these during a professional demonstration.


Wow! I guess I'm not getting the Abloys sometime soon!!!

Anyway, here are some pics:






Hope someone can help me with this one before I go back to the UK (October).

[HeadHunterCEO]

i like that tension wrench

[David_Parker]

Really can't help you except that maybe impressioning might do the trick.

And aren't laminated padlocks those of stacked plates that Master Locks are notorious for? I could be, and most likely am, very very wrong.

-Dave.

[jubb]

Man that looks tricky, I'd try shimming it to get the abloys and work on picking it later.

[jubb]

Sorry, I just looked at it again, and shimming it looks as hard as picking it, so I'm reducing my comments to Good Luck!

[Mad Mick]

Dave, on looking intially it appears to be a solid bodied lock, but I can assure you that it's laminated. If you look at this pic, you'll see that there is some form of coating covering the layers:



Sorry for the image quality, I'm trying to macro with a lens not designed for a camera

[Mad Mick]

HeadHunter, the wrench is made from a wiper blade strip, with a whipping of approx 25 turns of 15lb mono to lock the shanks together. The part not shown incorporates some form of relief bends to stop the material from snapping - this material will not sustain a 180 deg cold bend, so I just make a series of bends to create a diamond, which also allows you to put multiple wrenches on a keyring.

Hope this gives you some ideas.

[Mad Mick]

**Update**

I had to give the Ingersoll back today, as my mate/boss said he needed it, but I still got the Abloys. There are five, all keyed-alike, so now I'm off to search for info on stripping and reconfiguring the discs ......

[CitySpider]

Glad the whipping worked out for you.

[scientist]

Padlocks im not sure about, the regular cylinders come out from the back in an assembly

-sCi

[Mad Mick]

Sci,
when I opened the lock with the key, the lower plate appeared to be riveted to the lock body when looking down the shackle holes (removable shackle). I couldn't see too well because of the rust, but there didn't appear to be any sort of screw head. Had to give the lock back but I may get to have another look at it sometime....

'Spider,
the whipping works great, I'll finish off the Falle-style double prongers and give them another whirl.

[MACS]

These area a very secure padlock. There are 5 key profiles I think. There are 5 depths and they can be mastered. There is no pick resistance on the levers. Five levers on each side of the keyway. Sidebar mechanism. You have the second generation. There is an earlier version which is slightly smaller and the third version is machined out of a solid block rather than from laminated pieces. When the padlock is unlocked the shackle can be fully removed and you will be able to access a screw at the bottom of each shackle hole. Unscrew these and the base plate will come off. Insert the key and turn the cylinder and at the same time pull out on the key the cylinder can only be removed when turned approximately 90 degrees. There is a rubber O ring on the base of the cylinder so you will need to give a reasonable pull.
If you don not have the key you would basically have to destroy the cylinder to get it open - unless of course you could pick it. It is not impossible to pick. I use just a standard HPC curve pick and two heavy duty tension wrenches that I move from each side of the keyway as required. Hope this helps.

[Al]

My record on a door is under ten minutes but I have spent 90 minutes on them in the past. As ever access can be a problem with padlocks.
You need to slowly increase tension until you can get one of the levers to bind then gradually work through the lock nudging each one up in turn. The tenth lever feels a million miles away using a thin hook pick!
Don't be afraid to add a little light lubricant on these padlocks.

[raimundo]

Mick,you say the body is laminated, and coated with somthing, but the photo makes me think the lamination is hidden the same way pins are hidden in brass padlocks, by grinding the tell tale marks down, which also produces a smearing effect as hot metal moves off the edges. That's what it appears to be in the photo. On brass padlocks that have brass pins in them, you can sometimes see round dots that are the pins showing up because the brass is a different alloy, ad there is the old loksmit trick of dinging the surface with a tiny ball peen which will sink the pins a bit and show their lines where they sink a tiny bit.

[Luke]

Mick has not posted in a month and a bit. Im afraid we have lost yet another valuble board member.