Mon Dec 02, 2013 11:42 am
Walked into Academy and Opened a Liberty Safe!
Just wanted share an experience that I am absolutely PUMPED about. My cousin is visiting for Thanksgiving and we had to make a run to Academy sporting goods. While he was browsing, a helpful sales guy directed me to the gunsafes. I wasn't sure what I was going to do when I found them. I expected to see all digital locks but there were several mechanical combo locks. I couldn't resist. My eyes basically glazed over and I walked up to the first one I saw and started spinning.
The first thing I noticed was the pressure of the situation gave me nice shot of adrenaline. My cousin sauntered up as I grabbed the dial. He is finishing up his training for a Tier 1 special operations unit. He's a Navy guy, I'm former Army, and I reeeeaally wanted to show some skills and open that fucker. He's seen my weird collection of practice locks strewn all over the house, so he knows what I've been up to. I didn't want to look like a chump, but I think he also had realistic expectations that this was probably a long shot. I looked at him and said, "gimme five, bro." He chuckled and walked off.
I immediately noticed a heightened awareness and sensitivity in my finger tips as I began to spin. I was waaaaay more focused than I am in training. I'd had a nice open on a 6730 earlier in the day in practice and I was feeling pretty confident. As I checked the first contact points, it felt like running into a brick wall and I knew from the feel that it was almost certainly a 6741. I knew the 1.25 increment dialing tolerance was on my side and I thought to myself, "holy shit...am I about to open this thing?"
I did an AWL approach starting at 0 and checking RCP only. I didn't have a lot of time so I decided to advance by 2.5, especially since the 6741 would help me get away with it. The lock read consistently through the first 10 readings which gave me confidence that I would see a noticeable drop at that first gate. I find it's harder to do it without a graph if the CP are kinda bouncing around along the way. I felt super in the zone and I was dialing precisely even though I could feel my hand shaking a little. At 42.5, it cratered by almost 0.5. I backed off to 36 and advanced by 1's checking LCP as well. I settled on 42 as the strongest indication. I was about 5 minutes in at this point.
I thought about assuming it was W3, but things were going so well I didn't want to blow it. I decided to isolate W3 so I set W1 and W2 in the forbidden zone at R8, and dialed W3 to L38. I advanced by 1's up to 46 and saw a little drop, but not much. I figured W1 and W2 at R8 might be shadowing a little so picked a random number and put W1 and W2 at R80 and checked W3 again. The contact region shrank considerably and I was 100% at that point that the gate was W3 @ L42. The realization that I had a personal best going made my hand start to shake a little more...
Next, I ran W1 & 2 RA, W3 @ L42. I've been practicing this move a lot recently after some of Oldfast's recommendations in my "I suck..." thread. I've eliminated extra turns and it goes waaaay faster now. At W1&2 @ R77.5, W3 @ L42, I fell off a cliff. I amplified and found the gate was at R77. I wanted to be sure it was on W2 (my assumption), so I dialed a few test combos with W2 in isolation. I think I did: L42-R73-L42, L42-R74-L42, and so on all the way to L42-R80-L42. My contact region remained at the baseline until W2 @ R76 to R79. I picked 77. At that point, I knew the combo was X-R77-L42.
I started running combos for W1. My wrist was starting to ache and my pulse was racing. I kept expecting my cousin to show up but he never did. By the time I hit 50, my confidence was starting to decline. Then...
My hand shot to the lever. I cranked the bolt work open, gave the door a slight tug, and turned swiftly to walk away to find my cousin. The door sort of drifted open behind me.
His response? "Dude, you should be able to open it. Have you seen how many fucking locks you have?"
What a dick!
I don't know what the total time was. He though it was about 8 minutes, but I am pretty sure it was in excess of 15. Either way, it was a personal best for me done under pressure and I am really satisfied with how much I have learned. This was a far cry from the 17 hours it took me to open my first one three months ago...
This was a case where everything just went well. The CPs were solid, things sort of happened in the right order, it all came together. I suspect I'll have trouble repeating this, certainly not in such a short time. But there is only one way to find out...I have a feeling they'll be seeing a lot of me at Academy.
The first thing I noticed was the pressure of the situation gave me nice shot of adrenaline. My cousin sauntered up as I grabbed the dial. He is finishing up his training for a Tier 1 special operations unit. He's a Navy guy, I'm former Army, and I reeeeaally wanted to show some skills and open that fucker. He's seen my weird collection of practice locks strewn all over the house, so he knows what I've been up to. I didn't want to look like a chump, but I think he also had realistic expectations that this was probably a long shot. I looked at him and said, "gimme five, bro." He chuckled and walked off.
I immediately noticed a heightened awareness and sensitivity in my finger tips as I began to spin. I was waaaaay more focused than I am in training. I'd had a nice open on a 6730 earlier in the day in practice and I was feeling pretty confident. As I checked the first contact points, it felt like running into a brick wall and I knew from the feel that it was almost certainly a 6741. I knew the 1.25 increment dialing tolerance was on my side and I thought to myself, "holy shit...am I about to open this thing?"
I did an AWL approach starting at 0 and checking RCP only. I didn't have a lot of time so I decided to advance by 2.5, especially since the 6741 would help me get away with it. The lock read consistently through the first 10 readings which gave me confidence that I would see a noticeable drop at that first gate. I find it's harder to do it without a graph if the CP are kinda bouncing around along the way. I felt super in the zone and I was dialing precisely even though I could feel my hand shaking a little. At 42.5, it cratered by almost 0.5. I backed off to 36 and advanced by 1's checking LCP as well. I settled on 42 as the strongest indication. I was about 5 minutes in at this point.
I thought about assuming it was W3, but things were going so well I didn't want to blow it. I decided to isolate W3 so I set W1 and W2 in the forbidden zone at R8, and dialed W3 to L38. I advanced by 1's up to 46 and saw a little drop, but not much. I figured W1 and W2 at R8 might be shadowing a little so picked a random number and put W1 and W2 at R80 and checked W3 again. The contact region shrank considerably and I was 100% at that point that the gate was W3 @ L42. The realization that I had a personal best going made my hand start to shake a little more...
Next, I ran W1 & 2 RA, W3 @ L42. I've been practicing this move a lot recently after some of Oldfast's recommendations in my "I suck..." thread. I've eliminated extra turns and it goes waaaay faster now. At W1&2 @ R77.5, W3 @ L42, I fell off a cliff. I amplified and found the gate was at R77. I wanted to be sure it was on W2 (my assumption), so I dialed a few test combos with W2 in isolation. I think I did: L42-R73-L42, L42-R74-L42, and so on all the way to L42-R80-L42. My contact region remained at the baseline until W2 @ R76 to R79. I picked 77. At that point, I knew the combo was X-R77-L42.
I started running combos for W1. My wrist was starting to ache and my pulse was racing. I kept expecting my cousin to show up but he never did. By the time I hit 50, my confidence was starting to decline. Then...
OPEN: L54-R77-L42
My hand shot to the lever. I cranked the bolt work open, gave the door a slight tug, and turned swiftly to walk away to find my cousin. The door sort of drifted open behind me.
His response? "Dude, you should be able to open it. Have you seen how many fucking locks you have?"
What a dick!
I don't know what the total time was. He though it was about 8 minutes, but I am pretty sure it was in excess of 15. Either way, it was a personal best for me done under pressure and I am really satisfied with how much I have learned. This was a far cry from the 17 hours it took me to open my first one three months ago...
This was a case where everything just went well. The CPs were solid, things sort of happened in the right order, it all came together. I suspect I'll have trouble repeating this, certainly not in such a short time. But there is only one way to find out...I have a feeling they'll be seeing a lot of me at Academy.
), if time and effort are put into it! 
