What did you pick today?

[mseifert]

950? Wow he might as well have let you keep it at that price.

the lock is mine .. I purchased it for $9.50

[KPick]

yeah thats very cheap. i found the cheapest one on amazon for about 13 dollars US.

[logically]

Here are a couple things I've done since I last posted.

I bought this little $2 warded lock for my daughter because she wanted to play with locks like dad. I was really bored and found a bobby pin on the ground. I bent it with my leatherman and of course, was able to open the lock easily. Nothing impressive, but it was a bit of fun.



Next up was a lock I got from the security dept. where I work.



No one knew the combo for it. How did I pick a combo lock?



With the keyhole in back of course! This one actually took me quite a long time to pick open. When I finally did pick it, I had to use a small screwdriver to generate enough force to turn the cylinder far enough to open the shackle. I don't know anything about this lock or if it's considered easy to pick or not.

Also picked this masterlock 1 UP



Really easy to pick, but it was cool because my boss needed me to pick it as we were at a maintenance gate and he didn't have his keys with him. He really didn't want to have to drive and go grab them so my picking saved the day!

[Divinorum]

Hurricane is coming through so I am stuck inside this 4th of July.


It could be worse.....

[KPick]

At least you gave yourself something to do while you're inside. Should of took something time consuming, like a medeco or a sargent and greenleaf lock.

[Divinorum]

Those are my warm up, they are going in order of difficulty. The main course are a few sergeant KIKs, a Corbin, Marks High security, and a Medeco biaxial. My eyes may be bigger than my stamina lol.

[KPick]

Those are my warm up, they are going in order of difficulty. The main course are a few sergeant KIKs, a Corbin, Marks High security, and a Medeco biaxial. My eyes may be bigger than my stamina lol.

LoL I bet they are. I would be evaluating my skills against those Medecos short.

Are you hiding out in a basement? Looks like you'll have some fun in there with these locks.

Admiring the lock collection their though. Nice collection Div.

[mseifert]

Got my first chance to attack a lock in the wild today .. This Master M530 was locked on one of your work trucks and the keys were lost.. It has actually been hanging there for a long time and I didn’t mess with it encase someone did find the keys… Someone came by to buy the truck today and I asked if I could have the lock .. Supervisor said, “If you can remove it you can keeps it”.

I have to say that it is really different to pick a lock in the wild than sitting at my workbench/desk. The angle I could hold the lock at was limited and even with a spray of WD-40 I still twisted my tension wrench turning the core. I would recommend if you really want to test your skills, go and attach one of your locks to your fence latch or wrap some chain around a fence post and give it a shot. This gave me a different outlook on lock picking..

[YouLuckyFox]

My mood effects a lot of what I'm able to do. A pal of mine asked me if I could make a key for a toolbox lock (I hadn't impressioned a wafer lock before.) I learned from BillDesertHills to have a little more faith in myself instead of just turning down any job I hadn't done before. I ordered blanks for the lock (nickel-plated was cheapest .) I tried my HVAC tape technique, as it is awesome for getting the spacing for locks. Because it was a wafer lock, the wafers scraped against the key on the way out and ruined it. So then I tried the 45 method and was able to get a good scratch. I tried smoking the blank after awhile of being a bit impatient (hadn't impressioned a lock in probably more than 4-6 months!) I worked on it for 20 minutes and then I was like, "forget it, I don't have time for this." I went and told the guy the next day and pretty much whined about not having time to do it (this was yesterday I met with him and got the lock taken care of) and he was like, "eh, let me see what you do with this technique." He helped me relax and I started blabbing about this and that and I started getting progressively better at seeing the marks (knowing a false from a true impressioning mark.) This guy is very good with tools and such, as he has a graduate degree in the welding field of study. He was able to put HVAC tape on just the 45 on the blade and the wafers didn't pull the tape off after getting impressions! We were able to get 3 firm, extremely visible, positions on the HVAC and then he did something I've only heard of Rai talking about before: he measured the distance between two adjacent impression marks and used the calipers to scratch the blank where the other spacings would be! I got more familiar with the different look of the impressioning marks and we got way close after an hour or two before grinding the back off and pulling the core out* (he just wanted to give up and I had started working on another project after a certain point.) Turns out we were just off by a depth or two on 3 out of the 5 spacings. Pretty cool, and I learned a lot from the guy. This hobby has helped me to be more patient in my problem-solving and has even helped me be more analytical with machining/welding!

Another trick we experimented with was putting a streetsweeper bristle in all the way back, lifting all wafers up and pulling back till we heard a click, then pushing the bristle against the 5th wafer and scratching the bristle just outside the lock to mark the distance from the face of the lock to the 5th wafer, repeating with wafers 1-4 (in descending order) and using that guide to verify the placement of impressions. This I did before my pal thought of using the calipers. It was a fun experience and I would not have learned how to impression wafer locks if I hadn't toughed it out and had patience.

*By "grinding the back off" I am referring to the fact that the cam of this cheapo lock was secured to the plug by two extensions of the plug being peened flat and mushroomed around the slots in the cam, thus we had to grind the back part off to remove the cam (if this part on the back of a cabinet lock is not called a cam, please correct my terminology!)

[Gr3yGh0st]

I picked an Ace copy of the Master 150. Not that hard, then again I'm a massive noob when it comes to picking.

[mseifert]

Saw this in the pile and decided to give it a go for old times sake ... Master 570... Check out that bidding .. Makes it a bear to open

[keyringkey]

Hello all,

I picked a Mila 6 cylinder Euro, Wink Has 5 pins cylinder and an Asec 5 pins cylinder. I am going to learn how to pick 5 lever mortice locks now.

[Divinorum]

Today I picked a bunch of mortise cylinders on loan from a friend.

Concept

Strangely all spool pins.


Marks



Corbin
6 pins. Definitely has some spools. Unfortunately the retaining cam screw is badly stripped and would not come off.


Metro
5 pins all standard.


Universal
5 pins all standard.

5 pins all standard.

[wheelfly]

A one pin Medeco! Multiple times! And then I doubled the difficulty and picked a two pin Medeco. Multiple times! I must have used up all my openings for today because I can't open it anymore.

[YouLuckyFox]

I can totally relate, often times I feel like I only have so much luck for any given day, week, etc. General Patton believed the same way, if I remember correctly.