Miwa Double Sided Wafer

[Schuyler]

Melvin2001 traded this off to me a LONG time ago now. Finally got around to opening it up:


Simple enough keyway


Simple enough key


Again...


I removed a circlip at the back of the plug that was ostensibly holding the plug in the lock and picked it a little bit while pushing in, forcing it partially out of the back. This is actually a really fun, iterative process. Weird feeling of picking in this manner.


The plug fully removed from the lock.


With the key inserted so you can see how everything retracts nicely. I should have grabbed a shot of the inside of the housing, but you can guess at what's in there. Nothing unusual.


This brass bar is what keeps the individual wafers in place. The springs are bastages, as they don't clip into the wafer in any particular way, so reassembly is rough. Anyway, brass bar keeps the springs and wafers in place. There is one on each side.


The whole breakdown. Those comb-looking things are braces that go around the spacer discs (the ones with the keyway cut in them)


And then this shows another part of the assembly. The guy on the left is sandwiched around the guy on the right, which is wrapped around the guy in the middle, who is demonstrating how he can grip nicely on to the spacers, which, in turn, would contain the wafers. (one brass bar missing in this picture)

There you have it.

[Kaotik]

I like it!

[Jaakko]

Wow, if I got it right, that is something like 20 wafers in there

Picks easily?

[cyrus104]

Very nice job, great pictures to show everything.
Now all we need is something like this for every model of lock.

How long did the reassembly if it was reassembled take?

[Schuyler]

:shock: Wow, if I got it right, that is something like 20 wafers in there

Picks easily?

only 8 The spacers don't move, only the wafers in between.

Not an awful pick at all, just a bit weird.

[Schuyler]

Very nice job, great pictures to show everything.
Now all we need is something like this for every model of lock.

How long did the reassembly if it was reassembled take?

Happily I have a second one! So...no, haven't reassembled it.

I'll be honest, it didn't want to come apart. I had to bend the bits that fit around the frame that holds the brass bars.

[zeke79]

Why not post this in the lock breakdown thread???

Just kidding hehehehe . Nice photos

[cyrus104]

Well if you are going to break a lock so it won't go back together at least we get some good pictures and are able get a better understanding of what is inside.

Gotta love the learning experience, more for me then you I am sure.

[Schuyler]

Hehe, thanks Zeke

Well if you are going to break a lock so it won't go back together at least we get some good pictures and are able get a better understanding of what is inside.

Gotta love the learning experience, more for me then you I am sure.

Heh, I had a pretty good idea of what was happening in there, but noticed some incorrect speculation about this lock and wanted to have good photos to correct some misconceptions.

[greyman]

Schuyler, thanks for posting these photos. That's the first time I've seen concrete info on the Miwa wafer lock on this forum.

There's up to 10 wafers, but they often key them with less, eg to allow master keying or just to be slack. I read on the web a while ago that Miwa made more than 50 million of these units and almost everyone in Japan had one. Then a number of easy bypasses were discovered and the s.h.i.t hit the fan.

They're quite hard to find in Japan now due to the replacement frenzy.