wrote:
On Sat, 01 Nov 2014 15:01:23 -0400, KC wrote:

Again, I agree. Youtube all you want, then try it. I tried to Youtube a
lock for our trailer, the technique, perfectly applied failed miserably.
When I was a kid I decided that since I kept losing house keys, I would
just make a pic set and learn to pick the locks around the house. I was
always pretty good with tools and such, had a friend who helped me make
the tools (his dad did locksmithing) but never actually had success with
a 5 pin houselock and rakepick...

Lock picking just takes the touch,. Once you get the hang of it, you
can do it.
You put tension on the cylinder and probe each pin, feeling for the
spot that it lines up, when you get them all, the lock turns.
A high quality "pin" lock, where the tolerances are tight, can be
tough, those with the wafers like a desk drawer lock are trivial.
They have vibrating picks that are a lot easier to use

Or you just make a bump key ;-)

Some of the door locks are really hard to pick, as they have a notch in the
pin to defeat the pressure method. But lots of locks are easy to pick.
When I started at NCR we all made lock picks to open registers that the
customer lost the keys, and we did not want to go to the office to get a
copy.