Even tough I never met him, I am starting to like Ian Cecil.
In the comments of the previous posting read had a different theory about what actually happens when you bump a lock.

This is what he wrote:

—
Every theory even so called facts have to be challenged.

So here is an experiment everyone can do.

1. Make a cutaway cylinder so you can see the top pins.

2. When you hit the Bump Key, what would you expect to see? The current theory would suggest you would see the top pins fly up above the shear line, just for a millisecond. Also you would see the top pin with a large bottom pin fly up further?

3. So keeping the cylinder perfectly lined up bump away…

4. Anyone with a high speed camera should be able to photograph the pins separated. (personally i have not seen this). They only separate when slight turning pressure is applied no matter how hard you hit it.

I would also suggest that the practice of turning the bump key just at the right time is also not correct. It is better to have a constant pressure like picking.
No pressure at all dose not cause any separation of the pins. so no point trying to get the timing correct.
—

Now, I like this way of thinking. Never assume anything, test and see for yourself. It is the only way to learn and find out new ideas.

So I followed Ian’s advice and assembled a cut-away lock.

And Ian is right. If you just hit the key, you do not see the pins move. But …. does this mean the pins do not move?
I think it just happens too fast for you to see, and maybe the blow of the hammer on the key causes your eye to close for a split second …

Unfortunately I do not have access to a high speed camera, so now I had to figure a way to ‘capture’ events that occur in a split second.

In my first experiment I used a thin piece of wire and bended it in a L shape. Then I just hung it in the top of the spring, the
The little wire was so short it did not made contact with the top pin. Yet, when I bumped without turning pressure, the L shaped wire jumped right out of the plug.

So something was moving, and I suspected the pin to push it out. But in theory it could also be the spring.

My next experiment was using grease. I greased up the springs and clearly photographed the cut away lock. This is the ‘before’ picture.

After that I hit the key ten times (without tensioning the key), and the result is the image on top of this posting. As you can see, all the grease was pushed out severely (here is a ‘before/after’ image). And most interesting on pin 1 and 5, there was now grease on the side of the top pins!

The fact there is a grease residue on the pins prove to me the pins did travel. And you can also see by the way the grease was pushed out of the chamber.

Of course I could be wrong, but for now I am still convinced the bumping theory works as advertised ….

For a long time Han and I are doing tests for various lock manufacturers. At the beginning, most of the requests were concerns if the ‘bump proof’ pins they came up with were really bump proof. And most of the time they were not.

On average it took three rounds of testing (and back to the drawing board) before we could not bump open the lock anymore. In some instances we supported the manufacturer with some technical advice to really make the lock bump proof (or highly bump-resistant).

And of course we have been thinking about designing our own bump-proof pin. We labeled it ‘the search for the golden pin’.

In our view, the golden pin has to have (at least) the following properties:

1) Prevent bumping one hundred percent (bump-proof, must withstand ‘advanced bumping’)
2) If possible, make other kind of attacks more difficult (like picking, impressioning and decoding)
3) The solution must contain not too many parts and must be easy to manufacture
4) Easy to Add to a classic 5 pin tumbler lock without modifying the core or house (too much)
5) If possible the ‘golden pin’ must be implementable in dimple and or other pin-tumbler style locks
6) Free of patents

Han and I have been partly successful in this search. And still we are having new ideas and brainstorm/try out sessions on a regular basis.

But ever since our trip to Vienna, our way of looking at the problem has changed.

We learned that if you ever want to have your invention implemented by a lock manufacturer, stop searching for a ‘golden pin’, and start searching for a ‘golden key’!

That is right, lock manufacturers are under constant pressure to come up with new patents on keys. A ‘patented key’ is required in all serious projects, and when a patent is ‘end of life’, so is the commercial success of the lock. Or actually a couple of years before the expiration of the patent (after all, who wants to buy something that will lose it’s ‘copy protection’ in three of four years?).

In a way it is a very healthy system. It keeps lock companies innovative. They can not just design a lock once and live of that design for ever. It forces them to keep investing in engineering.

The flip side it that great locking systems all of a sudden become ‘worthless’ because of the patent expiration. And in some instances that is not fair if you look at the level of security the lock and keys are still providing.

Looking at our mailbox, we are not the only ones looking for the golden pin….

A couple of times per month we receive mail from people who came up with pins or solutions against bumping. In almost all cases the six above properties are not met.

One of the last mails I recently received was from a gentleman called Ian Cecil from Australia. His invention is somewhat smart and makes use of the ‘floating pin’ principle. With that I mean that one of the pins is not reaching the ‘9’ position. We have first seen this solution in CES locks where they simply did not drill the hole in the plug all the way. And other floating pins can be found in systems like GeGe Pextra, Nemef and Master padlocks.

But before I take you to all the solutions we found in various locks, back to Ian:

Ian cam up with the following idea: Use a short spring that is connected to the ‘stopper plug’ and the ‘bottom pin’. And the bottom pin is by magnetic force attracting the top pin. If you keep the top pin small (0-3), the bump key can not make contact and obviously does not work. As I said, a nice invention but far from ‘bump proof’. The lock can still be opened by ‘advanced bumping’.

How does advanced bumping works? If I know there is a floating pin inside a lock, all that is required is a set of probe keys to determine the position and minimum depth of the floating pin. And once that info is decoded all I need to do is cut a 99949 key and open the lock.

Still, Ian makes a lot of sense on his website and shows he does know what he is talking about. Who knows, maybe he will come up with a ‘golden key’ one day ….

We are in the process of having a special pickset designed for ‘the last Hope‘ conference, and are thinking of other cool gadgets/merchandise we can bring with our logo on.

Even though the ‘LED ring‘ is a nice gadget, it might send out a wrong signal having it handed out with the Toool logo stamped on it.

The last thing I want to do is give our hobby a bad name or bad reputation. And images like the one above certainly can be interpreted wrong. But the idea of using an LED ring for picking locks is just too funny not to mention.

And they are pretty cheap too (mirror) …

I admit, I have got a lock fetish. Especially when it concerns government or military locks.
But for readers of this blog it might even be the reason for visiting here ….

Well … Yesterday at some sort of flea market in Amsterdam I found some interesting suitcases.

Some with labels and stickers that caught my attention.
Triggers like: Nato unclassified, Nato Awacs, and various other stickers.

But the best was yet to come: some cases had locks on them, with complicated looking keyways!

So getting the cases for 10 euro each was not a problem and I immediately took them to my favorite locksmith. He studied the lock for a minute orso, and then tried a DOM blank (silca DM28)…. It was the correct blank …

On one hand I was happy he had blanks for me, on the other hand I was a little disappointed the locks were not extreme high security and had restricted profiles.

Needless to say I went home and tried to make a key for the locks via impressioning. But that was much harder as I thought as the plastic from the side of the case the lock was mounted in absorbed my movements.

So I first had to pick the small five pin locks in order to open the cases, then remove the lock and mount them in a vice.

But after that it went relatively smoothly and a correct key was made in a couple of minutes.

Now I just need to find a purpose for the damn cases …..

* Update: in the comments, Agent X is asking for more images of the cases.
Here they are, enjoy: cases1.jpg, cases2.jpg, cases3.jpg and label.jpg

I am on my way with Han Fey to visit some lock factories in Vienna.

If all goes well I should be able to shoot some unique video footage … if they allow that …
Or maybe Han and I will collect some nice locks to write about.

If there are people out there in Vienna reading this and want to meet up, just send me a mail (barry (at) toool.nl)

Furthermore I got persuaded to write a forward of Marc Tobia’s his book on Medeco locks, and it takes up some of my time.

The challenge is to write something fair and balanced, and not get carried away too much. I will manage and I hope to make the deadline.

And on top of that I have to send in corrections of things about me in the book. Unfortunately that also is some work too …

More coming soon …

We have another mystery….

A couple of weeks ago a locksmith mailed us some images and asked us if we could identify the special ‘key’ you see above.

Little is known, and little information is given to us. So it might be another police investigation that is stuck …

The key seems to be made of two parts that can slide. At first it looks like a change key to a safe lock, however I do not think it is.

I honestly have no idea what it is, but do want to know the answer by now … does any of my readers know?

High resolution images can be found here: image1 image2 image3 and image4

The first one with the correct answer in the comments will receive a Toool pickset!

Visitors of Toool are being treated well lately.

First there was the article on Master’s new Axis padlock by Michael Huebler, and now there is a new article by Han Fey.

ASSA’s TWIN sidebar system makes it very difficult to pick or otherwise manipulate the lock. Combined with it’s extreme tolerances, the lock it is one of the higher quality locks on the market. And one of my all time favorites.

As always, Han covers the lock deeply, answering many questions. Questions you did not even knew you had ….

I hope you enjoy assa-twin-part1.pdf (2 MB) … I know I did!

And Han does have some questions too … who knows more about a seven pin version of the lock?

(* Update: fixed broken link)

Well … I did not actually pick the lock. I used simplified impressioning to create a working key.

The nice thing about Toool is that it attracts interesting people. Some of these people come to learn about locks and lockpicking, others come with interesting lock related problems.

Last Tuesday’s Toool Eindhoven meeting was no exception. It was the day someone (who wants to remain anonymous) brought an Enigma machine and wanted me to make a proper key for it.

For those unfamiliar with the enigma: it’s a (by now) famous encryption device used by the Germans during World War II (wikipedia).

It is pretty rare device, and the most common place to find one is in a special museum or in history books. Yet someone brought one to a Toool meeting and gave us all the opportunity to have a close look.

The reason the machine was brought to Toool was because the key was missing. The only thing the owner did have was a key from a different machine that worked on the lock once.

For me it was a great advantage to have a key that is known to work at least once, as it would make my job a lot easier …

Under normal conditions I would just remove the lock and examine the levers to cut/file a proper key. However, at this device all screws were still sealed with a special kind of paint. The owner of the box was real keen on keeping this seal intact, and I can’t blame him for that. One other security feature that caught my eye was that the lock had the serial number of the device stamped in the housing.

My approach to make a key was relatively simple. I knew from emailing with the owner what type of key to expect, and came prepared with a range of blank keys.

At the club I filed one of the blanks down to same hight as the key he brought with him, except on my key all cuts were about one millimeter higher.

After filing this key, I used a marker to ‘paint’ the surface of the key red. When the ink dried, I inserted the key into the lock and gently tried to turn it. It did not rotate all the way, but already opened the lock!

Looking at the key I found that the ink was scratched on two positions. Filing down these two positions a little made the key fully turn and operate the lock. Still one more round of filing was needed to make the lock operate smoothly.

Maybe under normal circumstances no big deal, but the uniqueness of this device made it very memorable for me!
And I sure was happy and relieved it went so smoothly.

Of course we had many questions for the owner of this device. The main question was where he got it, and how he managed to get it. His answer sounded somewhat familiar: By writing on the internet about various encryption devices, and publishing about reverse engineering some of them, he became a known source of interesting and rare information. And because of his high google ratings on scrambling devices, he came in touch with lots of other people who share the same interest. Someone who owned an enigma machine contacted him because of these publications, and offered it for sale. The rest is history….

This approach shows interesting similarities with how we run Toool. We too benefit from the fact people know to find us because of our various publications and known expertise.

Of course we wanted to know if other kind of locks were known, and we learned only Naval Enigma machines were equipped with locks. The standard naval ‘three wheel’ device even had two locks. The one brought to Toool was a special ‘four wheel’ enigma used in submarines.

Worldwide around 200 of these machines are known to still exist. Around 30 to 50 are four wheel naval ones. And we were all pretty pleased to have one of them at Toool Eindhoven! (like Walter, Jos and Geert-Jan)

A nice software version of the Enigma can be found here http://users.telenet.be/d.rijmenants/
(and sorry guys, I did not manage to ‘crack’ the messages in the previous comments with it)

Wow! Yesterday visited Toool Eindhoven, and had a very, very good time.
On ‘Blackbag Sunday’ you can read the whole story.

Or maybe someone can crack the puzzle by identifying the image below …

You know it’s april fools day when some of your friends installed an extra security add-on on your door to make you feel more secure ….