by Grudge » 18 Feb 2005 10:45
Anti-pick is about as meaningful as "Tastes Great" or "New and Improved". Tastes great compared to what, dog food? New and improved from what, miserable to poor?
Anti-pick is generally composed of one of more of the following: restricted keyway, tight tolerances (which reduce the ease of getting pins to set), special driver pins (mushrooms or spools), non-standard pin configurations (tubular locks, dimple locks) or no pins at all (disk tumblers, magnetic locks, IR, radio), sidebars, rotating pins and so on (which means I probably forgot some). Sometimes Anti-pick just means it has a funky configuration which isn't really secure BUT a standard Southord pick set won't do it (most tubular locks fall into this category).
Cost doesn't always provide a 100% indicator either. The Brinks sheilded padlock available from Walmart for about $11 has spools and is one tough cookie. However the Brinks rekeyable padlock has spools and is about the same as a Masterlock (I believe because of the really poor tolerances).
That being said, Anti-pick doesn't mean unpickable. It just means it may take longer or require special tools or techniques.
