"Homemade" weighted tension wrench thingy idealike

[le.nutzman]

Alright, something for you newbies, and experienced pickers as well, to wrap your head around (it's a bit long, but a good read).

First let's start off with the basic issue in lockpicking....tension. I have, over the course of the locks I have picked, noted greatly that the amount of tension to turn one lock plug from one brand of locks is not always the same amount for another. That being said, I went online and was looking at decent tensioning tools, I'm a huge believer that you can never have enough tension wrenches!

I found this HPC weighted tension wrench (on MBAUSA.com, ya gotta be a member to view, but widely available on other websites as well) which when used correctly, allows for literally one handed lock picking. I thought this was a joke idea, but decided why not? I've seen worse and i've seen better. So instead of forking out $45-$50 for this tool, I started going through my kit and looking at what I already had, then it hit me.

I had a long medium flex twist "L" wrench that I hardly ever used due to the length. So I took this wrench, and at the opposite end of the "L", I made a smaller "L" bend in it, something that would just catch the top of the keyway (i'm a huge fan of top keyway tensioning because it leaves more room to manipulate the pick). That being done, I took the smaller end and placed it in the top of the american 700 lock I used for my test, and at the other turned up "L" bend, i placed two uncut key blanks. Voila, my very own weighted tension wrench!

I started to pick the lock completely one-handed, and because my other hand was doing nothing more than holding the lock, I was able to really see the tension wrench movement whenever I set a pin, hit a spool pin, and was setting a falsely set spool pin (reverse feedback). Now, you're probably thinking that yeah, this is a pretty dumb idea. But, consider the new people who you always see posting in the forms, "Help me with this lock, How much tension do I use?" Well here's a way to answer and educate them at the same time.

I see this not as a practicle means of picking all locks, but moreso as a means to help people understand just how much tension you need. Things that I've taken into consideration: length of the flex wrench, weight of each uncut key blank, type of lock. How you can use this to teach yourself proper tension is add a single key to the end of the wrench and begin picking your lock, if you can't set any pins and they just keep falling down, you're not using enough tension, add 1 key. I've now done this on about 5 different locks, all American padlocks, including two 5200s, it works. Generally speaking, you'll never go above the weight of two keys.

Drawbacks, yes there is one, you're no longer feeling the feedback in your hand that was not only holding the lock, but also holding the tension wrench. But that is countered with the fact that your hand now being free, you're concentrating less on maintaining constant tension as it's being applied for you, and more on what's going on inside the lock because you're still feeling feedback from the pick and visually seeing the tension wrench move when you false set or set a pin. This is especially good for those who don't quite understand the spool pin methodology of reverse feedback. Picking a lock using this weighted tension wrench allows you to concentrate more on the lockpick and watch the wrench start lifting and rotating backwards until it sets and then swings forwards as you set the pin, which in some cases is that last pin and the lock opens.

I know, cheesy, probably not one of the better quality postings I've made, but in the interests of the amount of new people I've noticed on LP101 lately, I hope this will actually help to a degree explain the appropriate amount of tension to use when picking a lock. Your feedback and comments are welcome and requested.

[JK_the_CJer]

You rock for trying this out! I had previously considered this just a gimmick, etc.. but you make it sound like its at least worth a try. I'll pick up an assortment of small fishing weights and have a go soon. Thanks for the post, its got me thinking about tension again

[pickmonger]

I know of a locksmith that smashed one of his hands in a car door.

By using tension wrench weights he was able to still open some of the locks faster than his able handed employees.

Is anyone up for explaining the physics of the process.

ie length of tension wrench times weight equals what unit of measurement

The only one I know of is foot pounds which sounds like over kill.

[Eyes_Only]

Inch pounds?

[Squelchtone]

Nutzman I like the idea.

I was toying around with something similar and had my team of artists here at Squelchtone Industries draw up a prototype using Maya.

The design works on the premise that the further a weight is from a fulcrum point on a pivot the more work it will do and thus apply greater force on end opposite the weight. So I came up with the idea of attaching a threaded rod to a tension wrench, and having a movable weight in the form of a knurled nut which can move towards the tension wrench or away from it, applying less or more tension as needed.




The wrench in this stock photo is at about 7 o'clock. My design would have it be at 9 o'clock with the threaded rod attached at a level angle, not bent like in the picture.

some of the math behind this is on wikipedia under lever
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lever


Squelchtone

[ridderhenck]

There is no such thing as coincidence....last night I looked at the site of HPC and there was this picture of a weighted tensionwrench.I was thinking,yeah right!!But I got curious,why would one build one,no feeling anymore,so I build one myself and I was amazed....it works,just like you all could read in the other posting.I use a tube,on one end there is a thread to tighten the tensionwrench in,on the other end you can put in small amounts of weight,like leadballs used for fishing and then close the tube,the tube I used can be seen at www.newsparkling.com,it is used for picks,I think it was number 4040,anyway,it works
Building took just two minutes,it was thinking about how and what that took longer

[ridderhenck]

I see something went wrong with mentioning the site I mentioned,it is www.newsparkling.com

[ridderhenck]

oooooops...it,s been a busy night and day
It is www.newsparkling.com.sg

Well,at least now it is right,

[ToyMaker]

Pound-foot is probably too big a unit to be useful. Ounce-inch is one that first comes to mind - a common hobby rc servo produces about 40 ounce-inches of torque - this is probably way too big also.
Because le.nutzman used 1 or 2 key blanks for weight, I think that gram-centimeters unit of choice to produce useful numbers.
Since a key blank might weigh in the 10-20 gram weight range and a tension wrench might be 5-10 centimeters long, the working numbers would be in the range of 50 gram-centimeters to 200 gram-centimeters.


robotic regards,

Tom
= = = = =
A man without a woman is a bachelor. A woman without a man is a genius.
- - Maxine (John Wagner)

[raimundo]

make a loop at the end of a tensor, you can attach a long rubberband, one of those that are around bundles of newspapers, then put this in the loop. and hang a weight on the end of the rubber band, pull the rubberband down, a little, and it will start the weight bouncing, giving pulsed intermittent tension going from zero at the top of the bounce to full weight at the bottom. the long rubber band makes the frequency slower and last longer.

another one handed picking scheme is to put a rubber band from the tensor to the little finger on the picking hand.

[le.nutzman]

I enjoy the feedback i'm getting on this alot! I know that this is nothing new and that someone else has already thought of the idea, but i gotta tell you, there's something about lockpicking with one handed that's kinda cool! I went home and busted out all my practice locks I have, again mostly American 5200 padlocks and a few others, and yes, I was able to pick them all with no problems whatsoever.

I guess why I thought about this mainly, is because we read so much on "the right tool" to use, or "how to pick this lock". I think that at the very minimum, if everyone were to try this, in whatever variation that has been mentioned, it would open a really big door on that ever elusive factor, Tension.

While I can't yet say that this has made me better at picking all locks, it has given me a much MUCH better understanding as to what the right amount of tension looks like from an outside perspective. Sometimes you just have to go back to basics.

Some new things to consider, someone had mentioned that I was using key blanks as the weight and that the weight ratio should be in grams. I'm going to be experimenting with various things through the next few days, such as different blanks, different types of blanks. For the initial test i used two brass AM1 uncut key blanks, I also have a bunch of the AM1 blanks in silver so i'm going to try those as well and see if there's much of a difference.

I think, if this were employed as a regular use, I think that the tension wrench should be serrated, like the Peterson Flat Five wrenches, to maintain a positive hold on the keyway, who knows, maybe someone will be smart enough to combine Squelchy's idea with a few serrated teeth and we'll have one hell of an adjustable tension wrench.

Thanks for all your feedback!

[Afisch]

The turning effect of the force is force x distance from this pivot, if you could ajust the distance as squelchtone said you could easily do it with a 10g weight.
At the end of a 10cm wrench this could produce, 0.01 Nm, say 2cm from the wrench, youd get 0.002 Nm. This should be enough variance i think, unless maybe using a 20g weight for padlocks. You could have the sliding weight much like an old metranome.

[linuxbz]

Afisch, I just searched Amazon for "metronome" and got three pages. Most are electronic these days, but they did have several old-style ones starting around $25 US. I bet the part that swings could be bent as the tension wrench itself, and might be just perfect, since it is designed for easy but positive movement of the weight. Imagine if you could buy just that part from the manufacturer!

[Afisch]

i would imagine most of the mechanical ones would be classed as antiques these days but if a cheap one was available, junk sale etc, it would also have a nice scale on it.

[gstrendkill]

i think its a great idea. and adjustable weight would be cool, with the whole nut and bolt type idea