What did I see?

[satanicmechanic]

So I lost my car key and went down to my local lock smith and asked him what he could do - since this is in Korea this involved a lot of hand actions!

He understood fairly quickly and smiled and came to my carpark and this is what he done:

It involved a sandwich of three rectangular steel plates - on one of the outer sheets there was a piece of paper and on the middle one a scribe. He pushed these into the lock removed one of the outer sheets and slowly withdrew the middle sheet with the scribe. As it was withdrawn it drew the key shape on the paper which he then used as a template on a blank key. I think the make of the tool was STK. So what was it all about.

While I am on I am having trouble with warded padlocks here - basically they seem to have a lot of spring steel wires as say 4 or 5 pairs as the holding mechanism for the shackle - any ideas?

[freakparade3]

you need some holy water

[Eyes_Only]

He cut a key using a template???

[raimundo]

thats what it sounds like, and that isn't really difficult if the template is right. for the template to be right, pins or wafers have to be at the shear, so it also seems to have picked it as well, was there tension on it,
I will have to find a link to that company an see what it is, another thing is what did he do while slowly withdrawing the piece, I think there must be more too it.

[satanicmechanic]

I kept the description brief as I thought someone may recognise it quickly.
I have been unable to find anything on this on the web - anyway a more detailed explaination:

The rig consisted of three plates of thin steel say 1-1.5mm thickness, they were roughly 150mm long by 75mm wide in their main section the part that went into the lock was - well the size of a car lock.

Looking at the lock - the rig was inserted into the lock and the left hand plate removed - the right hand plate had a thin strip of paper attached to the main body located on the logitudinal centre. The middle section had a scribe on it which lay against the paper throught a window in the middle plate. This scribe was attached to some sort of mechanism on the middle plate inside the lock. The lad slowly withdrew the middle plate and as he did so the scribe traced the key shape on the paper. This paper was then used as a template for the new key. I watched closelyand saw no obvious tension on the device and could not see anything other than a simple lever arrangement attached to the scribe. Unfortunately it was dark so I could not see as much as I wanted to. oh and the key worked first time - I was impressed.

Now how about these warded padlocks - does anyone no the type i mean

[zeke79]

Automotive tools are not for the open forums. The warded lock discussion is fine, but any more talk of the auto tools and the thread will be locked .

[satanicmechanic]

Sorry, I knew that, I was more looking for a name of what I saw rather than anything else. If I can just ask if you reckognise what I am describing - that is all I need - I will find out the rest another day.

Right sprung steel warded padlocks folks - an thoughts

[Chucklz]

There are people here who know what you saw. Ask in the advanced forums if and when you get access. (IE stick around for a while, contribute and then apply... not suggesting that there is any reason why you wont get access at some point)

[satanicmechanic]

Right oh, thanks for that - all the more reason to hang around. I have a real love of clever mechanisms. I won't mention it again on an open forum.

I have picked up all sorts of interesting locks out here - I'll post some pics later - a lot of them seem to flatter to deceive though as the look complicated but are quite easy to get round. It seems to be the smaller padlocks that give me a headache, I am a real novice though so please be gentle when I ask stupid questions.