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Found this one floating around in my folks' garage on my last visit. Was working on mounts for my combo locks and caught this thing peering at me from inside a tool chest.
Definitely a little rusty, but it works well enough. My first thought was, "Dirty lock, might be a little challenging." Then I removed the key saw the narrow keyway and the bitting some jerk gave it. I thought, "Ooh, now this could definitely be interesting!"
The keyway was probably the most challenging obstacle. I had to use the one wrench in my kit that I absolutely hate. I use Southord slimlines, and even then only my smallest hook would fit. I figured that might make avoiding an overlift of the front pins rather difficult; but as it turns out, not so much. It ended up being somewhat anticlimactic in the end, but it's still a neat little lock, and the only one I currently have with that sort of keying.

Kind of curious if any of you folks have run into other Waterbury padlocks with this sort of bitting.

I have one Waterbury. It has a VERY small keyway. I didn't take pictures of the keyway unfortunately. I had to use a very slim hook to even get in there and the bitting was horrible. It was max depth in the very center and back two pins were very high.

Have one as well. The keyway is very tiny. Mine came without a key, so impressioned one. Hard to do with six tiny brass pins so close together. The hard part was that the previous person had tried impressioning a key - and left the broken part still in the lock.

Correct me if I am wrong... looking at this on a phone. Your pictures with the key looks as if it has incremental steps on the bitting. Like you could take a straight tool and line up the bits and pins.

Congrats on a very nice lock.

Gordon

Yep, it's mostly incremental, except maybe two cuts nearest the shoulder that look like they're pretty close if not matched in depth. Hard to say for sure without a micrometer, but they're definitely not equally stepped like the rest. If they were though, I'd say that straight tool idea would be great, except it looks like the key wards might make it impossible to reach the correct angle. (Unless maybe you used something shaped sort of like a square root symbol.)

Wow nice job! You've inspired me to start working on the old Hercule again.

these sort of things make you start by producing a pick to scale for the lock.

very suprised that some have got them open with commercial picks.

on the plus side, very small picks are easy to make, you find the right tiny material, usually flat spring steel and there is not much to cut away and not much to polish.

I have a couple/few Eagle Padlocks that are marked U.S., for footlockers, lockers, armory racks, or any application, and they are a total pain in the brain to pick. In years past I would use LAB turning tools and sometimes a LAB pick when a Rytan Mini-Blue wouldn't cut it, but Rai is right, best to start bending, filing and sanding on your own tools for some of this stuff. Between XEO prodding me to use turning tools in the TOK and Rai being a continual influence, I have been making some specialized tools and actually getting some results, too.

Hard keyways man. The convoluted keyway and bitting is double-trouble. Some of these locks are basically unpickable in the field. You add in the elements, lack of or otherwise poor maintenance and twisted hand positions and we don't get the same results as holding in the hand or a vise, etc.

When I was an 18yr old, I had a few handmade small length picks with me in army basic traing at Ft Campbell Ky,1967, opened a few footlockers when people lost keys, the footlockers were locked by cheap wafer locks from the PX,
the drill sergeants found out and one of them brought me into the orderly room, and handed me an eagle brass padlock stamped US. he told me to pick it and left me alone in there for the fifteen or twenty minutes it took to pick that bear. I can only think now that those handmade picks were probably just too large as I am now making things smaller and it appears to be more effective.

Guess it is a good thing they were not using Medeco locks back then, though you'd probably have no problem with them now.

Aside from an a$$ chewing, what else did the drill sargeants say... uhh... yell to/at you?

Gordon

I believe my REESE US SET padlock is quite similar. Oldfast made a key for that one.