So I bought a very cheap doorknob set from the dollar store (they were out of padlocks) to practice single pin picking on a lock with no security pins. I took it apart so that I had the lock itself out of the doorknob and had successfully picked it about 50 times, when all of a sudden upon opening, the tension got terribly tight and I could not rotate the core any further in either direction. I decide to take the little piece that holds the springs and pins in place off to see what was going on. One of the springs had somehow made its way all the way past the pins and was caught in the shear line. I had to re-pin it with 4 pins instead of five, but did something wrong along the way and now the key doesn't work.
So.. two questions.
1) Is this a common problem with extremely cheap locks, or did I do something wrong?
2) Is there a simple way to make or adjust my key to fit, or would it be easier to take it apart again and try my best to match the pins to the key?
Thanks!
-LadyLock