speed bump technique not working on difficult bitting.

[south town ninja]

So i had such an easy time picking my american lock with six serrated pins that i decided to make the craziest bitting possible with the keypins i happen to have. all the pins are very high or very low set. however, i am having a hard time figuring out which pin is binding using the speed bump method (taught to me by jgor). obviously this has to do with the bitting. so i tried to go pin by pin, applying pressure to each, feeling for springiness or firmness in each pin. not only do i have difficulty deciphering which pin is binding, i often can't tell which pin I'm on, which pin is set. oh, it's a mess. So i've resorted back to pocking, proding and praying. it works about half the time. Any advice?

[Squelchtone]

speed bump method? please explain what that is exactly.

[Comrade627]

speed bump method? please explain what that is exactly.

He's referring to applying torsion, and slowly raking from back to front with a hook or whatever to feel for a binding pin. Non binding pins will raise, bound of course will not raise.

It works alright, but I'm a poke n prodder. I feel I can get more detail that way, which matters more than anything IMO.

attention to detail

[FarmerFreak]

That technique works well if the binding pin is resting at the bottom. If the binding pin had previously been lifted, possibly to a serration. You would have to find it by going one pin at a time.

[south town ninja]

Doing that presently, and it's working well. The problem with crazy bitting is this though: I can't seem to keep from oversetting when i lever off of the wards, so i have to go up from the bottom of the keyway, and my thick pick rubs the side of the ward. often this leads to oversetting. grrr. maybe it's time to mod my short hook.maybe i'll sand it down to .18" or so, and see how that works.

[Comrade627]

Yeeep. Select a pick and make it thinner.
Also, if you've got a really short pin behind a really long pin there's a great chance of overlifting the long pin while lifting the short pin. For this, use a pick with a higher reach.

[UnlockingBoredom]

South Town Ninja,

Be very careful with your pick if you thin it out... I thinned out my favorite short hook to work on an American lock 1105 and it was working great until I snapped close to the tip I may have thinned it too much as I didnt measure it after thinning.




Happy picking!

[nite0wl]

The thing that finally got me burning through my American Locks was thinner picks. My personal favorites are Peterson's 0.018" euro-profile picks but the main thing is having something that can easily navigate the warding.