Shim Problems

[skold]

hey

i have a problem with my shims.. they seem to open some locks up to 40mm but any thing above that my shims just bend in with the shackle groove and are not strong enough to push the lever in..

btw.. my shims are made of Coke cans... i heard this works well.. can any one recomend a better material??

thanks

[cred]

hi,
there has to be enough room around the shackle to insert the shim otherwise they will not work

[skold]

yes there is certainly enough room..seeing as it's double locking they have to both fit..which they do, its just that they are sorta week

[WhiteHat]

some padlocks have anti-shim balls instead of using just plain bolt-like things...

[hzatorsk]

I've also seen the notches machined into the edges of locking bolt at the point that the shim would contact it. Designed to trap a shim preventing it from pushing back on the spring.

[Guitar_J]

I find that coke cans are too weak to do much more than master combo locks and such... find stiffer metal... or buy some shims...

[zeke79]

either buy some actual shims or make some out of a cheap measuring tape.

[SolidAnchor]

Little off topic but does anyone know where I can find the coke can shim video? I found two links already using "search" but ones dead and the other dosnt seem to load.

Thanks.

[Guitar_J]

Jason Lynn's Video? yea... it comes and goes... someone was hosting it... but I forget who... they may have taken it down...

I did a little video of me opening a padlock with a popcan shim... here is the URL...

This really isn't a very complicated thing to do...

http://www.thelockpicker.com/lp101/DSCN2854.MOV