2010 Sees New Lock Impressioning Speed Record

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bj9KEmLWRek]

[Jos Weyers] tipping us off about this lock impressioning video. It shows his final round of the lock impressioning championship at this year’s SSDev conference. Even though he shaved about fifteen seconds off of his 87-second single-lock record from last year he came in third overall because the competition averages times over several rounds.

This method of opening locks uses a file to create the correct teeth after examination of tiny marks on a key blank from trying to open the lock. We’ve seen foil impressioning as well as electronic impressioning, but video of the competitions makes this our favorite method.

11 thoughts on “2010 Sees New Lock Impressioning Speed Record

  1. so are these really valid? I mean they didn’t stick them in a door like medeco wanted~ anyways, awesome demo though. I would like to see someone do this outside in the dark though.

  2. Doesn’t the amount of work required vary from key to key?

    Probably the reason for averaging three attempts. Unless of course they all get the same key design.

  3. @jproach:

    First round everybody gets a keyed alike lock (so same amount of work) this round takes an hour. The six fastest go to the finals: during six rounds (20 min. each) all the contenders open one lock, which then gets swapped. So all finalists open the same 6 locks. The used keys are put in closed boxes so there is no way you know the key is supposed to look like.

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