wafer locks?

[Ultimate89]

I was wonder how you pick wafer locks? Do you have to have special picks or can you do it with a standard set? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Schuyler]

ball, half ball, snowman, or normal picks. You just have to understand how they work.

[Iceberg_Slim]

ball or double balls and just go up and down(vertically) in the keyway a bit with the pick, doesnt need too much tension.

[Deathadder]

or just take a snake rake and jiggle it

[Ultimate89]

thanks a lot I was totally lost on how to pick them

[webidiot2]

wtf when did we become nice?

[illusion]

I wouldn't recommend using a rake - repeated use of them on these locks *will* ruin the wafers and make the key inoperable. Rakes will work on these locks, but IMO it is a better idea to pick them wafer by wafer; won't take much longer, but you won't damage the lock.

Some need lots of tension, some don't - start using light tension and increase this amount if the wafers aren't binding.

Lift the wafers up, or push the wafers down depending on how they are arranged in the lock and you should feel them set with a distinctive feedback.

The last technique for you to try is this: insert a diamond pick with the point facing down into the key way. Using the flat side of the pick, lift all the wafers up at the same time as far as they will go. Using a wrench, apply a fair amount of turning force and slowly remove the pick. The wafers should now be trapped in this position, but should any fall down then simply repeat the previous steps until they all 'stay up there'. The next part is the tricky bit, but you'll get it fairly quickly with practice: Gently reduce the amount of turning force you are applying -if all the wafers drop down, you know you need to be more gentle-and the wafers should slowly drop down one-by-one. This technique works on wafer locks with either one row of wafers, or locks with two - I'll leave you to think how you could lift up both sets of wafers at the same time, and apply tension.

Some food for thought - try it out and see how you get on.

[Deathadder]

when i said use the rake, i didn't mean to actually rake the lock, just jiggle it up and down (not fast, though) until it opens

[illusion]

At any rate, I was merely giving my opinion on the matter.

To be fair, you could get the same effect jiggling any pick around inside the lock. When you specified a rake as the medium I assumed you were talking about raking open a lock. Sorry for treading on your toes, but I hope you can see that it was an easy mistake to make?

[Deathadder]

oh, no you didn't tread, i was merely saying what i meant to say, i should have been more specific

[lockeymoto]

I personally prefer the diamond, lift wafers 1 by 1, so i can feel whats going on, raking is like a slot machine - no control, luck.

[Eyes_Only]

A lot of times those jiggler keys they make for car locks work even better on wafer cam locks then on the intended auto locks.

[illusion]

A lot of times those jiggler keys they make for car locks work even better on wafer cam locks then on the intended auto locks.

Yeah... Some kid at work was running around with a set of jiggler keys and showing off by unlocking the staff lockers and openly admitting it.

I picked the lock to his locker and wrote a note saying:

"Dear Sir,

I notice you have learnt how to open lockers without the key, but by now you will also know you're no the only person with such a skill. By all means continue your interest in locks, but I feel it important to tell you that picking locks can damage them, and *insert name of hench bodybuilder* complained today that his locker wouldn't work.

P.S: I can open your car just as easily."

I know I shouldn't have picked a lock that was in use, but it was so worht it. It happened two weeks back, and he's still running out to his car at every opportunity to make sure it's still locked.

[robotmaxtron]

use the force for good luke.....

::insert star wars voice::

[xayandevorak]

Most of the wafer locks any more dont even need a tension wrench. I found a 6-wafered lock in a file cabinet, and just stuck in a homemade hook pick, set the pins with light tension, using the pic, and it opened. There's one for the movies. A friend of me actually bought a cheap-o safe from Wal-mart with a 4-wafered lock, and It can be done the same way, even without a pick. Anything flat will work as well. So much for a "Safe".