General Questions About Lockpicking from a Confused Noob

[Bobbybobbobbo]

So, a few months ago I got my first lock pick set and started putting into practice the stuff I'd been learning via online books and bosianbill's videos. I've been going on and off since then, busting out my picks once in a while and practising on a few old and new locks I've collected. However, although I can now pick most low-quality, normal padlocks and a few (well, one) euro cylinder, I can't do so with any consistency or understand exactly how I picked them, because I seem to be feeling things while picking that are contrary to my understanding of lock picking as a whole. For example, most of the time I can feel multiple binding pins in a lock even though I'm barely applying tension, or the lock opens even though I've only set 3 pins out of 5, or a pin that I'm setting gets stuck somehow and the key pin doesn't come up again, but somehow I can still open the lock.... I'm getting so confused now that, whenever I try to open a lock, I basically just move down the stack and try to set every pin that feels bound, then repeat that over and over until something clicks and the lock pops open. This means that I never get the binding order of the lock, but that doesn't matter anyway because the binding order, for me, changes on multiple attempts at picking the same lock. Are these problems natural for everyone, or am I somehow messing things up through lack of skill?

[FancyPants]

Sometimes a sloppy lock can be tricky because it doesn't always seem to want to keep the same binding order. When I was starting out myself, I think the best way I learned to understand what I was feeling was taking your easiest lock to disassemble and reassemble it with 2 pins. Now you pick the one pin. How did that feel? Did it feel "right"? If it did, go ahead and get the next pin in binding order. With 2 pins, you'll know if your previous answer was right or wrong before. If it opens right up, you know you your previous pin was indeed picked to the sheer line. If not, you know it wasn't (or possibly nudged it on accident). Try easing up on the tension tool a bit too, the more tension you have, the less sensitivity you have. From that exercise, build up on the number of pins you have in the lock.

Hope this method helps!

[spudwinkle]

I am having the same thing happening to me. One other thing that is happening is, I will some pins and when I give up I can hear pins falling and could not find the last one or two binders.

[FancyPants]

Spudwingle,
Be sure you aren't oversetting any pins. Try easing up on your tension as well a bit so it doesn't happen. What lock are you working on? Perhaps there are security pins you may not know about.

[spudwinkle]

I am sure I have been over setting some pins. Most likely when I am looking for the next binder.