by raimundo » 7 Jan 2005 15:15
that is a medeco product, there may be a lot of varients of the keyway, in fact the keyway is its central unique feature, I have picked some of these before and I do not remember securtity pins,(mushroom, serrated, etc) the difficulty in picking these is the keyway. notice in your photos that the pins are in a straight section of the keyway, and the rest of the keyway with all its warding is not associated with the pin holes. What do you need the rest of that keyway for anyway? just to make a strong key that won't break off. The best picks for these locks are made from stiff piano wire, the wire is round, can be found in music stores or near the base note end of your grammas piano. it is wrapped in copper wire. You will have to unwrapp the copper wire and get about 5 inches of wire, file and sand one end of the wire, roll it around a small round mandrel of whatever you find near, this is to make a ring that fits your second (bird) finger, put your finger in the ring and grip the wire with your index finger and thumb, bend it over a bit, so that you are holding a wire pointing straight out. clip this off at the length of the cylinder, bend a small hook, less than the dimension of the small part of the keyway where you can see the pins, remember that a hook should be less than the dimension of the keyway youare working in, you will move it upward to lift the pins, and you will want to work it under deep pins, this is why round wire is so useful in this paracentric keyway, it can slip into the lower convoluted part of the keyway if necessary much more agilely than any flat metal pick, when yu have made your hook, file and sand the tip, the hard piano wire should not be left with any sharpness at all, Ideally you will make a dome rounded tip the best thing about these piano wire picks, is you can complete a very good one in just minutes when you know what you are doing.
Wake up and smell the Kafka!!!