So first off, the thank yous:
Thanks to everyone (all 10 of you) that made it out tonight. I was
glad to see that good of a turn out. I was actually worried that I'd
be the only person there (Like Stephen Hawking at his time traveler
party).
Thanks to Bar Louie's for the awesome free food. That was a
unexpected.
Thank you Chris B for bringing the flash lights.
Lastly I want to thank John for helping out the people at the one end
of the table. It made it easier.
So the meeting notes:
We had a total of 11 people there (including me). Not all of them at
the same time. But it's a start. And really not too bad for throwing
this all together in the course of a week.
We started with chit-chat, and then Chris B, asked about picking
locks. I got out my home made progressive set and passed around the 1
pin (1 on the front of the lock). There was two reasons for this. 1)
to make it easy. 2) to show that you don't have to have much pressure
on the wrench when picking. With the 1 pin lock, you didn't even have
to push on the wrench while picking. the weight was enough to turn it
on it's own. I'm just sorry that we only had the limited sets of picks
to share between all of us.
There was also the question of where to get things, and what to buy. I
like SouthOrd. I have the MPXS-14 and it is over kill. Karl had a
smaller set, that looked pretty good. A couple of sites to buy things
at are listed below. Karl mentioned that Lock Pick Shop has a discount
code. Hopefully he can send it to the list.
http://www.lockpickersmall.com/http://www.lockpickshop.com/LS.htmlI talked a little about locks, and showed how to take one apart. I
would have liked to have had a more hands on portion for that, but
people were having fun picking the other locks. The 2 people that did
try to take the lock apart, found some problems. Mostly with destroyed
springs. It's ok. It'll happen.
One of the things that was brought up, was having a different venue. I
like to think myself a loud enough person when I need to be, but the
restaurant was too loud. Also while lock picking is something to do
without looking, sometimes when you're talking about parts, it's nice
to not have to use blinding flash lights. One suggestion was having
the meeting in a conference room at U of M.
Jeff brought up the TOOOL organization. Personally I think it would be
really nice if we could start a local chapter, or a chapter of another
internationally recognized group. It will give us more opportunities
to learn. TOOOL has offered to send some equipment out to help get us
started. More can be read about TOOOL membership at their website.
Lock Sport International is another group to look at if we want.
http://toool.us/http://locksport.com/Passed around tonight:
Locks
Picks
Deviant's Book
Give-a-way:
I'll try to have something to give away every month. Tonight it just
worked out that when I was going to start giving them away, I had the
same amount as the people there at the time. Quality and Quantity will
vary, but I'll try to have something.
This Month's give away was: home made plug followers, for field
stripping.
TOPICS for next time.
Bump Keys, I'll try to have at least 1 made up so people can try it.
Shimming padlocks. Please everyone bring 1 beverage can of choice
(empty and clean) and something to cut them with.
The difference between picking and raking.
Hope to see everyone, and more in a Month for meeting 2
-Chris
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