I've only been picking for about two weeks. I have some picks, and picked nothing more than a standard 5 pin padlock. Silver line.
Today I had a few new locks turn up, master lock 140 master lock 150 Abus 65/40 and a Yale 6 pin cylinder.
The 140 took me about an hour and a half to open first time and about another 45 minutes for another 3 goes. Now I am working on my tension and pick positioning, but can do it about 70% of the time with a hook.
Frustrating lock, but not too bad once you have figured out the spool pins and false sets.
I'll crack on with the 150 when I can do this pretty much every time.
Got this lock this morning at savers for about 40cents.
3pin, no security pins. Super easy to SPP and great to practise. Only marking I found on this were "CHINA 30mm", so I google "Master lock 30mm 3pin" and came up with this link: http://www.padlockoutlet.com/130D-Maste ... locks.html. Seems like this lock "Master Lock 130D" but the photo doesn't match. Maybe add this to the list.
If you turn one of your diamond picks upside down & run the flat all the way into the keyway& lift the pin stacks you can hold all the pins down at one time. Slowly slide your pick out & you will likely hear the click as each pin is released. I think this padlock has 4 or 5 pins as the key blanks I stock are all either 4 or 5 pins long.
I just noticed that the Master Lock 141 isn't listed on the chart. It's a 4 pin lock with a spool. My source for the spool pin is the video description found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsTWT9aEi2M
So I have seen several posts about the No. 5, and nothing that really helped me per se, so I cut one that I purchased last week open. I have had one heck of a time opening this lock, and I had to know why.
Master No. 5 Number of Pins: 4 Security: 0 (There is a steel anti-drill pin - see below)
So pin number one is an oddly shaped steel anti-drill pin. It has a pronounced bevel at the end that goes into the plug, and I think that this is where the trouble with picking it comes in. So far the only consistent results that I have had are from shoving an L rake all the way to the back of the lock, then pulling it out a little using the lightest tension possible the whole time. I can only SPP this lock successfully around one in ten times. My theory is that the bevel on pin one causes it to jam. For whatever reason, I cannot figure out what I am doing to get that first pin set correctly 10% of the time. I have seen the acutely beveled pins in a mortise that I have. All five of the pins in that lock are beveled like this, and it was a pain to SPP as well, combined with a restricted keyway, it was a nightmare. I destroyed the lock trying to make a cutaway out of it, however, I succeeded on another mortise with the same keyway; and I will be putting those pins in it to see what exactly is going on. I am willing to bet this first pin is what is giving others problems as well.
ring_zero wrote:So I have seen several posts about the No. 5, and nothing that really helped me per se, so I cut one that I purchased last week open. I have had one heck of a time opening this lock, and I had to know why.
Master No. 5 Number of Pins: 4 Security: 0 (There is a steel anti-drill pin - see below)
So pin number one is an oddly shaped steel anti-drill pin. It has a pronounced bevel at the end that goes into the plug, and I think that this is where the trouble with picking it comes in. So far the only consistent results that I have had are from shoving an L rake all the way to the back of the lock, then pulling it out a little using the lightest tension possible the whole time. I can only SPP this lock successfully around one in ten times. My theory is that the bevel on pin one causes it to jam. For whatever reason, I cannot figure out what I am doing to get that first pin set correctly 10% of the time. I have seen the acutely beveled pins in a mortise that I have. All five of the pins in that lock are beveled like this, and it was a pain to SPP as well, combined with a restricted keyway, it was a nightmare. I destroyed the lock trying to make a cutaway out of it, however, I succeeded on another mortise with the same keyway; and I will be putting those pins in it to see what exactly is going on. I am willing to bet this first pin is what is giving others problems as well.
Sounds like a Bump Stop pin. These can be interesting since the driver only enters the plug a little bit so there is no spring tension on the key pin below it.
Is there any detailed threads on cutting open a Masterlock no.5 for a cutaway? Other than using a high-powered rifle. I did a search but didn't come across anything. Being a newbie I would just grind off the top/bottom rivets and the floor would come off?
Sorry for the late reply, work has been somewhat hectic as of late...
Brian, the pin that I was looking at doesn't look like the one in the diagram that you posted. This is it:
SnowyBoy, I wasn't making a cutaway of a Master Lock, but a mortise cylinder. I destroyed the first one through a slight error that I made when I began the top cut on the shell. I cut too deep and the silos (for lack of a technical term) that the driver pins reside in wound up being too shallow to hold the driver pins and springs. The point is that the pins inside the mortise were beveled the same way and it made the lock difficult to pick. They don't go all the way past the shear line, yet you receive feedback that leads you to believe that the pins are set. At any rate, I found this to be very interesting, and I have been playing around with it. It turns out that the method (at least for me) is to use TOK torque/tension. TOK tension worked on the Master No. 5 as well.
Gordon, Haha. I did think about shooting the Master No. 5 at one point while I was trying to pick it, but my rational side took over and I decided to use tools to take it apart in a deliberate, slightly more helpful way.
ElGatoNegro, you can cut the floor off as you suggested, but that will just get you access to the locking mechanism. The cutaway that I was referring to looks like this:
This is what I was trying to do when I ruined the shell of the first mortise.