KIK or Mortise locks - Residential & business

[Tyler J. Thomas]

Titan was introduced to add a 6th cut to the original Kwikset key bitting specification; it is being or has been phased out in place of the SmartKey platform.

Gumptrick, be careful with using Everest. Everest has "open" keyways that aren't restricted. For example, the C123 and C145 keyway is readily available, which would defeat the key control intentions of your request IF that's what he's advertising to you.

I would suggest the following:

1) Everest/Everest29 restricted keyway.
2) Medeco X4
3) Medeco BiLevel

All fit your criteria except price point. They are available in multiple formats, they offer key control, and they are pick resistant. Bumping is not a problem either, only your dealer has access to the blanks. Everest restricted keyways and Medeco X4 are comparable in price; they run around ~$70 list for a mortise cylinder, for example. BiLevel is the cheaper of the 3, it runs ~$65 list.

If that's beyond your price point, you may consider shopping for cylinders on a distributors restricted keyway. These key blanks are controlled by the distribory and only sold to locksmiths who have enrolled in their program. It's quasi-key control at a reduced price.

Call around and ask local dealers what their cheapest key control offerings are. You'd be surprised what's all out there.

[gumptrick]

Titan was introduced to add a 6th cut to the original Kwikset key bitting specification; it is being or has been phased out in place of the SmartKey platform.

That's basically what I had read. The old 6-pin Titan that I remember from the mid-90's was discontinued several years ago. Then the Titan brand was brought back. But instead of being the original 6-pin lengthening of the KW1 the new design is totally different like we discussed here.

Gumptrick, be careful with using Everest. Everest has "open" keyways that aren't restricted. For example, the C123 and C145 keyway is readily available, which would defeat the key control intentions of your request IF that's what he's advertising to you.

Thanks. That pretty much agrees with what I was reading. I dug up a PDF of all of the different Schalge keying options and there are many different levels of "Everest" available. The catalog calls them out as follows:
Level 1 not restricted, shared by all dealers/distributors
Level 1+ restricted based on the first 3 digits of the dealer's postal code
Level 2 restricted based on time zone
Levels 3/4 - restricted based on a specific end user
...and various others that go up from there.

I am not super-worried about protecting against unauthorized dupes. I just don't want someone to be able to go to Wal-Mart or the average hardware store to get a copy made. If someone has to jump through hoops at a locksmith that's good enough for me.

[demux]

That pretty much agrees with what I was reading. I dug up a PDF of all of the different Schalge keying options and there are many different levels of "Everest" available. The catalog calls them out as follows:
Level 1 not restricted, shared by all dealers/distributors
Level 1+ restricted based on the first 3 digits of the dealer's postal code
Level 2 restricted based on time zone
Levels 3/4 - restricted based on a specific end user
...and various others that go up from there.

I am not super-worried about protecting against unauthorized dupes. I just don't want someone to be able to go to Wal-Mart or the average hardware store to get a copy made. If someone has to jump through hoops at a locksmith that's good enough for me.

And different keyway families as well. The B and D families are the restricted ones, which is where all the key control happens. The C family is wide open, which means anyone can theoretically get hardware in any of the keyways in that family. But the two common C family keyways are C123 and C145. If any hardware or WalMart store stocked any Everest stuff at all (which would truly surprise me in and of itself), I seriously doubt they'd have anything outside of those two. So if you didn't want to shell out for the truly restricted families, you could probably find something in C outside of those two and get close enough. It's kind of "key control by obscurity", which isn't really key control, but reading between the lines a bit in your posts, it may work for you and save you a bit of money. As long as you know what you're getting in to.

[gumptrick]

It's kind of "key control by obscurity", which isn't really key control, but reading between the lines a bit in your posts, it may work for you and save you a bit of money. As long as you know what you're getting in to.

Yes, that's exactly right. That's good enough for my needs.

[billdeserthills]

This means that a small piece of metal is all that is holding the core into the lock body--
The core actually fell out of the Titan knob lock on my shop door last month, when I closed the door too hard

After having seen the core of the Titan that doesn't surprise me one bit. I was shocked at how small and flimsy that little retaining tab is. I will certainly not be using the Titan, that's for certain!

In a way it's pretty sad. The old mid-90's Titans were noticeably better quality, more solid construction, than the standard Quiksets and at least they had 6 pins. These new ones seem like junk by comparison. It's not much different than the lowering of standards at Master.

Actually the Titan knob on my door is from the mid 90's,
I just turned the cylinder over & put it back in the knob. The landlord provided the lock, when I moved in 20+ years ago
and I'm trying to make it last--The whole knob feels like it wants to fall off, when I close the door, so it's my special challenge

[gumptrick]

Actually the Titan knob on my door is from the mid 90's,
I just turned the cylinder over & put it back in the knob. The landlord provided the lock, when I moved in 20+ years ago
and I'm trying to make it last--The whole knob feels like it wants to fall off, when I close the door, so it's my special challenge

That's got me scratching my head now! I clearly remember selling, as well as re-keying, the Titan back in '94-95 and that was a 6 pin lock without the ability to swap the core with a control key, like the description of the Titan on lockwiki as well as many other places. That lock took the KW10 blank which was just like the KW1 except it was longer.

If you visit Kwikset's company history webpage, it states the Titan was introduced in 1992 and then was re-branded "UltraMax" in 2002.

I am not sure when the "new" Titan with 5 pins and the removable core was re-introduced, but I remember reading about it a few days ago. I didn't bother to bookmark the page though.