Keys, Locks, remotes, repairs. Forest of Dean & Ross on Wye
Fire doors with panic bars may have OAD handles/knobs on the outside. This allows the door to also be used an an entrance.
Doors fitted with older OAD such as the Exidor 298 cannot easily be re-keyed if the tenants change or keys are lost. (The 298 is also discontinued and nigh on impossible to find). In the photo above a new style Exidor knobset has been fitted that has an easily replaceable lock cylinder.
Renault Koleos handsfree card supplied, cut and programmed. The original key was faulty and would not lock the car. This style of Renault card are renowned for becoming damaged. They might fit nicely in your back pocket, but eventually you’re going to sit on it and break it if you keep putting it there.
UPVC door gearboxes shouldn’t look like this one above. Customer could have just replaced the gearbox but instead decided to cut the faceplate into 3 parts, requiring a complete replacement strip. Most gearboxes fail due to door misalignment (not rust or being cut into bits).
Above is an antique steamer trunk. It had regularly been across the Atlantic. The chest hadn’t been opened in decades and the key could not be found. We opened the lock without damage.
Lost key replaced for Kia Sorento in Coleford. In between being purchased and collected the original key had been lost. It is normally much cheaper to get an existing key/transponder duplicated than cut and programme a new one from scratch.
Cutting a duplicate key for VW Crafter. Actually for this collaboration between VW and Mercedes the key is a Mercedes blank, but the transponder chip inside the key is VW. The advantage of using a computerised cutting machine such as the one above is that the duplicate key isn’t just a shiny copy of a worn key – the key is cut to correct depths.
Broken uPVC door hinge being replaced. A broken door hinge typically occurs when the door is allowed to swing open in the wind. Sometimes if the same hinge cannot be sourced all 3 or 4 hinges on the door will need replacing. The reason why you can’t just replace one hinge is that unless the centreline of the hinges is the same. If off centre there will be twisting/shearing forces in the hinges.
This is the lock for an Audi with keys locked in the boot in Gloucester. The vehicle is deadlocked (putting a tool down the side of the door to pull a handle/lift a button won’t work). In this case the locks don’t even work (even with the key). Somebody had either replaced them incorrectly or the connecting links had come off No option here for the customer apart from wave goodbye to one of their windows.
2 days later we had another example of a client unable to get into their Audi. They couldn’t use the remote (it had lost synch during battery change), the linkages had again come off the lock so the keys couldn’t be used either. Fortunately it was an older vehicle with manual window winders.
This is the remote PCB for a Saab that was not unlocking. The button has clearly disintegrated. We replaced the button for a new ceramic centred button and it now works fine. These black rubber centre buttons often fall to bits or the rubber perishes.
Above is the ASK (amplitude shift keyed) locking signal for the Saab remote. You can see the highs and lows of the signal trace correspond to the decoded binary sequence below. The remote repeats the signal several times for a single button press. The actual binary sequence will change each time the button is pressed. This ‘rolling code’ makes the illicit capture and replay of the signal to open the vehicle more difficult to achieve. There are ways to do it – but why would you unless you’re a criminal?
This lock was fitted to a commercial premises. It is a Chubb 3G110 which is an excellent detainer lock. (Detainers are a bit like levers). This lock costs several times more than a normal mortise lock.
The lock was opened to change the detainers so it operated with a different key. It was immediately obvious that somebody in the past had removed all the detainers. In this condition the lock could be opened by any key that fitted into the keyhole – or even just a screwdriver or lolly stick. What would have been presumed to be a very secure lock actually had no more security than a garden gate latch.
New detainers were fitted to the lock and it now secure – as it was designed to be.
This lock is closely related to the Chubb 3R3F that we saw in a previous post. Access control system repair | Ross-Dean Locksmiths (ross-deanlocksmiths.co.uk) There are also other versions which use the same detainer system but with roller or spring latches.
On an unrelated subject, we’ve been called to open 3 separate Mercedes cars this week with keys locked in the boot. One of them was at 3am on the M5. Normally we might open one Merc in a whole year. Not sure why Mercedes owners are being more careless than usual at the moment.
We are very busy for door repairs this week. Normally they peak early spring/late autumn. Shown below are parts of a very clearly broken top case. This particular part is long since discontinued but somebody makes a repair part for the case. This make/model full length mechanism is also unobtainable, although the gearboxes can be found.
Because the gearbox (not shown) has an odd PZ (handle-spindle distance) a complete replacement with modern mechanism would have been more expensive than a repair, and also required new handles to fit the modern handle-spindle distance.
Double glazing & UPVC repairs are normally far, far cheaper than replacing the entire window or door. Recently we repaired a door during the afternoon for over £1000 less than the price the customer was quoted for a replacement door that morning.
We picked this British Standard 5 lever lock to open a commercial premises for the client. The main key had been lost and the spare key was several hours away.
BS locks are designed to be difficult to open without the key. They have to have a certain number of possible keys, a minimum specific time for a cutting attack on the bolt, and various other limits. They certainly aren’t easy to pick unless you know what you’re doing. This lock is a Union Strongbolt and is one of the more common locks.