Perhaps a Unique Idea....?

[quicksilver]

I did a wee search for this concept and could not find anything specific so I thought I would run it by you all.
I was working with an air compressor and when finished I was bleeding the residual air from the tank. I had an idea and put it to the test. I used a simple lock that responded to a standard Majestic pick gun. I placed the tension tool and holding the lock (residential pin tumbler; kwickset, etc) I shot some air using a clean-up tip on the air compressor. What I did was to flip the thing with my thumb so that the air shot in bursts. Holding tension tool lightly in a manner away from the jet so there was no interference. --> It opened.

I tried the same technique with more difficult to access locks (padlocks) and was unsuccessful. The key-way needs to be very accessible and open. It does not appear to work well with pins set in a "deep / shallow" configuration either. But I believe the idea could be built upon.

There is nothing new here, I know. A stimulus of energy to bounce the pins to the shear-line could reasonably be anything. But compressed gas offers a new concept in picking a lock in a non-destructive manner. Whats more by using hot or cold gases the opportunities for dealing with a situation that dictates climate controlled "freezing" of a cylinder may have strong commercial potential (extremely cold climate, etc).

Experimentation is very simple but the tube or method to focus the jet appears mandatory obviously and the angle of approach is important as well. Have other folks experimented with differing forms of energy to stimulate pin travel to the shear-line? & if so, what worked and what failed?

[freakparade3]

I read a post here somewhere about using air. If I recall correctly it is in the advanced section.

[JackNco]

freakparade. i remember the post as well. but i think that one involved damaging the lock with high pressure. it was pretty much decided it wouldn't work. this on the other hand sounds like a fun idea to try.

I wounder if it would work with a pressure washer as well?

John

[freakparade3]

I've used alot of pressure washers working on the farm. I do not think they would be at all effective. Way to much power to try aiming at a keyway.

[JackNco]

with the industrial ones ide agree, but the cheap ones for cleaning cars ?

[freakparade3]

I still think it would be way to strong, but It would be worth a shot.

[RodVT]

While we are in the offbeat idea area. I think the physics would better support an alternating vacuum-pressure scenario. If you could pull a vaccum that affected the pin chambers, then when you released it, it would tend to pull up the top pins but leave the bottom ones alone. That combined with some air pressure (to quickly reverse the flow) and a little tension might work, especially on higher tolerance locks. Maybe a small but powerful fan (or compressor) with the intake and output ducted to a single nozzle that has a flapper valve to quickly alternate the flow....

Where is my foil hat? : )

[JackNco]

there would be no way to do this without drilling a hole drilling a whole of a calculated size in the lock. and DE is advanced.

thats if im understanding it correctly.

but im not one to snear at an imaginative idea. after all every crackpot has his day

[n00bking]

I have always wanted to try my water pick on a lock, too bad it would rust and the waterpick water head shooter thing is too big to fit in a lock....

[Trip Doctor]

Crazy, I had an idea just like that too, lol. I figured a pickgun would do the same though so I never gave it a try. Cool that you actually tried and got it to work though. Perhaps you could use something like a little plunger type nozzle that would fit just around the keyhole to direct all the air in there. You would have to rethink the tension wrench with that though, since the keyway is all blocked out. It'll be pretty sweet if you get it to work well with a variety of locks.

[raimundo]

trip doctor talks of a nozzle around the lock this could be something like a funnel, with something like a ring tension tool inside it, while for intermittent hitting, some kind of rotor like the tiny one on a passche h type airbrush.

[silent]

im calling dibs on the idea (im sure someone else came up with it before me)

viewtopic.php?t=3100

[Shrub]

Silent i can predate your post by another 3 years

I also think theres a patent that uses this that was made in the 60's,

[Trip Doctor]

And here we are thinking we're special .

[pip]

i know somewhere in the past i made a post about
trying this using an air-pistol with a co2 cylinder