Australian amateurs buying tools

[Python]

Hi all,

This is my first post. Glad to have found this board. I'm in Perth, Western Australia.

Have done a bit of picking and other fiddling around with locks, and am looking to get some proper tools. At the moment, making the tools myself is not a good option.

I've been trawling through the site, searching etc, looking for info on Australian amateurs buying tools.

The sites that people are buying from seem to be lockpickshop.com and lockpicks.com, and having no trouble getting them thru customs.

The brands that people are mentioning as quality are HPC, Peterson, and (to a lesser extent?) Brockhage.

I've looked over the online catalogues of both of those sites, and seen what they have to offer. Neither HPC nor Brockhage tools are available, and only the two most expensive Peterson sets are available (on lockpicks.com).

So what brand tools have other Australians been buying? Which sites have you been ordering through?

I noticed one person (Luke, I think) say they managed to get some HPC tools. From where did you order those? Or was it an industry connection?

[Chrispy]

I currently have a 21 piece set with a variety of picks and wrenches for a total of about $20 AUD and 10 hours in my garage with a bench grinder and a dremel.

I don't have a credit card and don't have any faith in the sets getting through customs, so I make my own.

You can get a really good pick case from Crazy Clarks (it's a make-up brush case) that holds all the picks, wrenches and even a plastic handle that I made out of a box cutter, for $2.

Chrispy

[MrB]

I think brands like HPC and Peterson are harder to get hold of unless you have trade connections. On the other hand Southord are easily obtainable and are perfectly fine tools.

[SFGOON]

Peterson has a website and will sell to anyone with a pulse. I've purchased from them quite a few times and have yet to be asked for any sort of credential. A word of caveat, the peterson tools are rather thick, which lends them durability but limits thier use in paracentric (narrow and wiggly) keyways. If you buy from them make sure to get slender gems as well.