A Replica Of Da Vinci’s Cryptex

Da Vinci Cryptex

What makes this beautifully crafted, hand-made Da Vinci Cryptex even more impressive is that a high school student made it.

Shared with r/DIY a few days ago, the creator [SandNpolish] got tons of positive feedback — and so he should. Made out of solid brass and tigerwood, the level of detail he put into it is incredible. From the carved lions face on an antler bone, being used as an end cap for the cryptex, to the other end, a piece of Damascus steel. The whole thing is gorgeous. He made almost everything by hand, making use of a lathe to shape the cylinders, and a milling machine to notch the inner teeth of the lock. The entire gallery of images is a pleasure to scroll through to see the project from start to finish.

We’ve seen lots of cryptex combination locks over the years here at Hack a Day — from something as simple as a paper-craft cryptex, to one made out of PVC pipe, and of course, even a 3D printed one. But all of them seem to be missing the fun part — as portrayed in the Da Vinci Code — where’s the vinegar and papyrus damn it!

30 thoughts on “A Replica Of Da Vinci’s Cryptex

  1. ‘Da Vinc’i? Funny way to spell ‘Dan Brown’.

    ‘Cryptex’ is a funny way to spell ‘bicycle combination lock’ as well.

    Geez, the spelling skills of the ‘editors’ just get worse.

        1. For what it’s worth, 95% of the time the editors don’t touch the piece other than to fix mucked up wordpress formatting or the occasional typo. Content-wise it is the author who is responsible for the opinions, analysis, summary, etc. So in this case, if you liked it or hated it, blame the writer. By all means if you feel it adds value to a conversation, be critical, be scathingly critical if you must, but, be accurate.

          In the ~35 articles I wrote for Hackaday, despite my best efforts an editor had to fix a typo on almost every one. Never once did anyone tell me what to write or how to write it. In one case an editor goofed and accidentally added a typo. And only once did an editor significantly change what I wrote to say things I didn’t mean. Probably 1/3 of my articles had typos that both I and whichever editor missed until sometime after publishing, which is high, but, the fault originated with the author (me).

          Keep in mind no one at Hackaday does this full time (? I think?), everyone squeezes their work in around a second job and the rest of their lives, rain sun or snow an article gets published every 3 hours 24/7, editors don’t get days off, and no one has a schedule so, some articles are more rushed and rushed for editing than others. I have a theory that Hackaday’s always gotten shat on by some of the more ornery readers for existing in the uncanny valley of professional coverage. If the quality dropped, there would probably be fewer complaints about it. But because it’s close to being great, people presume it’s like a newspaper or something, not a blog stuffed with part timers and amateurs.

          1. Tony – I think there’s a big gap between “Doing the best I can but acknowledging it’s not perfect” and “I don’t give a shit.” If I pick something you’ve done and find any fault in it that you could’ve amended given infinite resources, would it be fair to declare that you didn’t give a shit about it?

            I mean, perhaps they could fix the things you find fault with. But, you seem to be the kind of person that wants to be hateful to people no matter what, and you’ll poke and prod until you find something to be cruel about regardless. So, you’re not all that valuable as a quality barometer.

        2. If it is not Leonardo Da Vinci who invented that lock who is it? As you pretend he is not you should know who is the inventor.

          I would not be surprised if it is Da Vinci. The man is one of the greatest inventor of all times.

  2. It’s a real shame that so many people feel the need to make such negative and pedantic comments about the contents of these posts rather than giving some really good projects the attention they deserve.

        1. Hackaday isn’t reddit. Once a subreddit is created, it becomes the de facto public face for any niche it serves. This has the effect of enforcing a particular etiquette and style that isn’t really compatible with the “hacker” mentality. While there’s significant overlap in readership, I’ve been under the assumption that this is why this site is still around. It certainly isn’t just about providing articles for other blogs when they’re having a slow day.

          Hackers love finding problems and arguing for/against possible solutions. Social rules are the layers of dust that collect when hackers have stopped tinkering with an idea. The concept of hackaday is still powerful enough that people treat it as it’s own thing in an age where most blogs are either dead or undead. Neither the commenters nor the staff of hackaday should take this for granted.

          Negativity comes with the territory and is not a problem unless it’s abuse. In the case of the “editor” comments on this article, I think we all know Hackaday doesn’t have nor want more staff just for the sake of petty grammar. Their best effort is all we really need. What we DON’T need are trolls. What we REALLY DON’T need is the comment system losing it’s anonymous privilege because of a few idiots. That would see the comments plummet to zero on most articles.

          1. @John
            Ahahaha, yeah, look at those NORMIES and their stupid social rules!

            Realtalk: reddit sucks, but you haven’t identified the reasons why. The fact is that humans are social animals, and every group (and I do mean EVERY) has social norms. Sometimes those norms include an affected indifference or outright hostility to social norms as a general concept, but when such groups encounter an out-group it becomes obvious that the normlessness is itself a social norm.

            I’d agree that this community’s socially awkward standoffishness is part of the charm, but let’s not puff up our chests about that making us somehow morally superior.

        2. Yeah but we’re cleverer than them. And their overdone chuminess makes my teeth itch. And what sort of terminal case needs to get “points” for talking to people? I’ll score points the old fashioned way, ta.

  3. In all seriousness this is pretty awesome. This project was created by high school student. Hell I took different shop classes in high school, and we thought we were being cool when we made slingshots and wooden swords. I even thought I was super duper when I made ninja stars in metal shop. You also need to understand that this comment is coming from someone who has been called the real life MacGyver by everyone who has ever known me. I know I’ll get a backlash of booty chatter after this comment, But I just think that this is pretty cool and that whoever created it deserves credit where credit is due.

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