I had ordered a cheap transparant padlock out of China. Although it is a six pin lock, I could pick it touching only two of the six pins. I took a look at it and it’s interesting to see how costs were cut (the lock costs about $3 in bulk). Material has been drilled from the plug to save material. Also, the top and bottom pins are the same pins. This influences the security of the lock. If the pin is stack is not neatly at the sheer line, it will still open as the tipped pin will wiggle itself into the correct position. This is why picking one third of the pins suffices in this case.

I then looked at some euro cilinders in the same price range. It turns out that effectively, they have only one pin that needs to be set. You can use a random key to wiggle the lock open. Even more shocking is the fact that some people will actually put such a lock on their front door.

I had this Maverick lock in my collection for a long time. At a Toool meeting, I was playing around and decided to try and open it. Martin then suggested he make it into a cutaway version, which he did. I’ve made a short video to demonstrate how it works.

Getting practice locks that have no security pins, for new lockpickers, is not that easy here in the Netherlands. But sometimes, cheap “dollar stores” will have batches of cheap locks that are very easy to pick.

Martin found such a lock in a store in Belgium. The funny thing? The lock had actually picked itself during transport, probably due to vibrations, inside the packaging!

So that’s great news. We now have self-picking locks…

Jos showed up with an interesting lock. It’s a German lock for a cash drawer. Instead of using a key, you need to press several levers to open it. If you press the wrong ones, an alarm goes off (all mechanic!). One lever was not operational. Jord fixed it and made a small movie demonstrating the lock.

Sometimes, the people who visit Toool are there for a specific reason. They are collectors and have in their possession an old apparatus with a locking mechanism but no key. They come so we can try to open the thing without destroying it. As you can read elsewhere on blackbag, we’ve opened quite a few WWII crypto-devices for instance.

Yesterday, somebody visited us with an old time-clock. The lock looks simple indeed, but took considerable time to open, revealing the interesting mechanics on the inside. The owner was happy and so were we!