Locksmithing Blog

Press release from the British Geological Survey

We noticed it. It was about as dramatic as someone slamming the front door. So yes, we are fine.

New regulations to clamp down on unfair trading

This is great news, and will help put a lot of the rogue traders out of business. And there are few places with more cowboys than the “Driller Killer” locksmiths, whose work I am so frequently seeing. Even some of the large locksmithing organisations support drilling as the first resort, as they see the profits of their members as being more important than offering value for money. The ICL are different - we replace your lock for free if we destroy it (as long as it was working beforehand) so that quote won’t suddenly be “and another £40 for the new lock”.

Details:

On 26 May, new regulations affecting all UK businesses that trade with consumers are set to come into force, if they are approved by Parliament.
The Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations will protect honest businesses by targeting the underhand practices of ‘rogue traders’.
The new regulations will ban 31 types of unfair commercial practices outright. They will also establish a general principle not to trade unfairly, use aggressive selling techniques or mislead consumers, helping to close loopholes that have previously been exploited.
For more information on the new Consumer Protection Regulations, please visit the following website:
http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/unfairtrading

It’s that time of year again, where we survey the market and decide what area would be most profitable and useful to expand.

Hence we have just ordered a new selection of high-end car tools to try out, all the way from Australia. Assuming they are as good as they claim to be, we will soon be able to ensure a clean and relatively quick opening of 90% of the newer ‘laser’ type locks on cars made after about 2000, with absolutely no damage and no mess, and without the ever present risks of bent linkages and shattered glass present with some of the rougher methods that some other locksmiths might be forced to try!

If like me you have fun trying to recall the seventeen different PIN numbers you have, and so now only use a single card for everything, while the others gather dust and interest charges, you might like to know one of the reasons why signature verification was phased out for most things.

I’m not going to pretend that the UK didn’t have far more motivated signature checkers than the US guys encountered by our new hero, but it was still pretty poor.

http://www.zug.com/pranks/credit/index.html gives a humorous reminder of what you could get up to, before V day 2005. Meanwhile, http://www.zug.com/pranks/credit_card/index.html is simply mind-blowing!

Sadly, the company van died on Tuesday, blowing a water hose and emptying the radiator all over the road. Currently, service is pretty much unaffected, however, although on-site key cutting is not practical at this time, and any full strip uPVC replacements or door repairs will be slightly limited.

Parts are on order, and normal service should be resumed next Tuesday.

In the meantime, please don’t hesitate to call.

A collegue tells me that in his area, one large series of adverts in one of the big phone books by one national advertiser actually has many small adverts, all with local addresses, all across the area. They are desperate to look like a local company, and, to be fair, if they are prepared to open an office in every town to get an address, then fine.

Unfortunately, it turns out that the addresses being given are in fact not genuine. One turned out to be a derilict garage, whilst another, perhaps more worryingly, turned out to be a lady’s home, who said she had no knowledge of the advertiser and certainly hadn’t given permission.

Rest assured that this company has full permission and authority for both the addresses we use!

A site I frequent, Lockpicking101.com, recently had a small competition, wherein one member challenged the rest to find out his first name, for prizes based on the time it took. He doesn’t use his firstname, and goes by his second name at all times, even on legal stuff.

So a lot of people started trawlling through the 1500+ posts he had made on the board, and the like. However, the challenge post included his place of work. But you could hardly just call him up and ask him his first name, though, could you? The challenge was only 2 hours old, and he’d never fall for that.

You could. Listen to this.

This is a bit of a social comment. When I am out doing work for councils and companies, I get to go to some really charming places. Others are not so charming. Others, well, they leave you scratching your head.

This street in Manchester is typical of a number that I see when doing my job. It’s Leven street, M40 9DG, and I spent a good half hour talking to one of the few remaining residents.

(Click to zoom)

This used to be a good area, with strong social ties, but, with the rumours of redevelopment and the council pushing drug addicted and anti-social persons into the area, those who could started to leave.

It has in fact been 12 years since the first of these houses were boarded up. The remaining residents have campaigned, written letters, been to meetings, and tried almost every avenue open to them. Sadly, nothing has been done. Due to lack of heating and roof repairs, the remaining residents face damp problems coming through the walls, as well as social isolation and rising crime.

These houses, perfectly nice terraced houses, probably worth at least £40K each even in their current state, have just been abandoned, along with those who still live with them.

This seems to me to be an ideal case for an organisation like Shelter to lobby, and see what can be done towards getting these houses re-opened for lives and life, at a time when so many are in hostels, and affordable housing seems to be out of the reach of so many.

Almost every time I go to Blackpool, Thornton, even Morecambe, I am amazed by the effect the sea salt has on the locks in the area. Even relatively new locks on high use doors are frequently worn out due to the corrosive effect of the sand and salt driven into every crevice by the often biting sea breeze. Preston locks don’t have this issue with jamming due to sand.

So, how can we protect our locks? Firstly, *don’t* use WD-40, especially if you have a wooden door. Penetrating oils are great at freeing things up, but they either leave a sticky residue that leads to clogging as sand, spiders and leaves get stuck in there, or they flush away all the grease that was still protecting the lock internals, especially the bearing surfaces.

Cast zinc and brass are both very good materials for resisting wear, as they are slightly self-lubricating. Steel, as we all know, rusts. For this reason, you rarely see much bare steel,  with paints and zinc coatings being used to protect it. Normally, this lasts for years. In a salty environ, however, the salt reacts with the zinc, and forms a white oxide powder, which is called “blooming”. Alone, this still protects the metalunderneath, but, on a moving part, the oxide gets worn away rapidly, and the process happens again and again, until there is no metal left!

Lock curtains wear out in short time, and you start to need to jiggle the keys to get the lock to open. Pins and levers jam a little, and more jiggling is needed.

Tune in next time, for how to protect your locks from rust and decay!

http://www.peterborough.gov.uk/page-4620

From August 19th 2005:

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Locksmith sentenced on £2,750 benefit fraud charges