How Did You Get Started...

[Papa Gleb]

in this wonderful challenging and super fun hobby/profession?

Thinking about how I go into this hobby gave me interest to hear how others got into it and/or why? Dont remember seeing any threads like this so lets get this popping. Post your story here.

Ill kick things off: Walking one day in August (2014), I noticed 2 guys servicing or rather unloading a kids quarter ride machine and couldn't help but notice that they were emptying out a 1x1x1 (foot not inch) box full of quarters which would easily add up to grand. Worst part is that it was secured by a Master lock probably a 3 or 5 and my mind wondered into finding out how easy would it be to open it, minutes later searching youtube, Bill's videos obviously came up first and I started watching video after video then ordered my first kit (Sparrows) days later. By the time the kit arrived I had learned about the community, this board and more importantly the golden rules. For the record I have never, nor ever will or even plan to commit any criminal activity with my new obtained skill/knowledge

[jeffmoss26]

Stumbled across some of AWOL and Kokomo's videos while in college. Bought a crappy set of picks online and a masterlock clone at Walmart and I was hooked (pun intended)
Found this forum, started collecting locks, and the rest is history. I now help run Cleveland Locksport which recently became a TOOOL chapter.

[Geir]

I've been interested in lock picking for a long time, and every so often I've searched eBay for picks without finding anything.
Then a little while back I got a mail and in that mail was links to a set on eBay and I bought it with a see-through padlock.

Searched YouTube and found a lot of videos; Bill's, HT4, etc.
A couple days later (before receiving my set from eBay) I ordered a decent set (Southord) from lockpickshop, and being impatient I chose FedEx and had it in under two days.

Started with a couple basic (VERY basic) pad's and the rest is still to come.

[Werewolf]

When I was 16 or 17 , I played a pc game called Jagged Alliance 2. In that game , you have to put together a group of mercenaries , each with their own unique skills. One of the skills was lockpicking. That sparked my interest. So I went to the library to search the internet (yes , I'm that old) for lockinging stuff. Found the MIT guide to lockpicking. Started making my own lockpicks and taking appart locks to train on. It quickely grew into a hobby.
After high school , i couldn't find a job in my field , so i looked at the local night schools. One of them had a course in locksmithing so i didn't have to think twice. Shortly after , i got a job at a local locksmith. And I'm still here 10 years later. And now , i teach at the night school.

[WolfSpring]

When I was 16 or 17 , I played a pc game called Jagged Alliance 2.

One of my all time favorites!!!

When I was a kid I had a knack for breaking into things, jimmy locks, credit card junk and what not. Fast forward a few years and I'm sitting in Kuwait with a locked drawer on my desk that I had for 6 months and I wanted to know what was in it, took a paper clip and jimmied it open and an old guy working with me taught me a little about lock picks, made a couple sweeper blade picks piked up a ton of cut locks from a container yard and found wizwazzle on youtube and the rest is history.

[whizdumb]

Oddly enough, my obsession with the hobby began at a very young age with keys. My grandfather collected keys and had a couple of jars filled with them. He used to give me a few whenever I went by his house and I just remember wondering how keys worked and whats inside of a lock. It was the enquiring mind of a teenager that brought me to the point where I thought it'd be so cool if I could open a lock without a key using some needle-nose pliers and a bunch of the really thick paper clips was I able to get an old master lock open. Of course I had no idea what I was doing; only that it was very rewarding to have opened a lock without a key. Once I got to be a young adult, I, like many, found good old wizwazzle/awol on youtube and wanted to tryout some real picks. I purchased one of those folding southern specialties picks, followed by a southord set, followed by some petersons and the rest is history. Been picking ever since. Less now than in the past but still love the hobby. Whenever I explain it to other people I tell them that locks are just my kinda puzzles.

[Riyame]

Back when I was really young (maybe 4 or 5) I really liked locked. I had no idea why but they held some sort of fascination for me. After picking a masterlock around that time using nothing but paperclips I was hooked and it has been downhill ever since.

[mdc5150]

After a change in career I found myself starting to learn locksmithing. I had one person who was able to show me how to pin a lock but then he quit. After that everything I wanted to learn had to either come from the internet, or by talking to the co-owner of the shop who was in Oklahoma.

I was doing OK on everything but picking locks. I bought a pick gun but was embarrassed a few times on police calls when the pick gun didn't get the job done. That was what I needed for me to want to start learning to pick locks. After that picking became a hobby as well as a skill for my new trade.

[magician59]

Stumbled across some of AWOL and Kokomo's videos while in college. Bought a crappy set of picks online and a masterlock clone at Walmart and I was hooked (pun intended)
Found this forum, started collecting locks, and the rest is history. I now help run Cleveland Locksport which recently became a TOOOL chapter.

Appreciated the pun!

[Papa Gleb]

Excellent stories gents. Keep em coming.

[Mur670]

As with all minds of young men I had a fascination with how things worked inside and out with many hours spent in my dad's workshop. Fast forward to 2010 and it was the purchase of a particular book that reignited the fascination I once had for how locks worked. SHADOW WARRIOR by David Everett mentioned a part about picking locks as both a hobby and as a skill set for any young soldier to have in their arsenal. Moving on to 2012 and it was upon moving to far North Queensland, Australia with my infantry unit that I decided to dive head on into the hobby and purchase my first pick set, a goso 9 piece kit. I can remember being so impatient waiting for them to arrive that I made paperclip tools and picked a few locks around the house before my 'proper' set arrived a short time later. A few months after my initial purchase I got myself a Southord PXS-17 kit and the difference was instantly noticeable. I continued on and off for a fair while and it was after I discharged from the service that I got into the hobby more seriously and would spend hours on YouTube studying the videos of all the big names.

2015 rolled around and I decided I wanted to start meeting more like minded people in my community but found there was a lack of consistency with fellow Aussies on multiple forums in the fact that it would usually be a fair length of time between one persons post and me finding said post and trying to respond. It was then that I decided to found the AUSTRALIAN LOCKSPORT GUILD via Facebook where we now have over 100 members and we are also in the process of trying to get recognition with TOOOL. To top it all off I managed to land a deal with an Aussie supplier of lock picking gear and now run review videos for their products! Oh and I also managed to land an apprenticeship with a locksmith with some of my regions biggest government and commercial contracts!

This hobby has brought me so much joy and I am forever grateful for taking the journey down its long and winding road and it is a pleasure to have each and every one of you here to share the magic with

[Malekal]

Personally, I got inspired by the tv show Elementary. Thought it'd be a good skill to have.

[HT4]

I first tried picking about 25 years ago, when I was in middle school. Back then, there wasn’t the impressive public knowledge base that there is now. If memory serves, the MIT Guide to Lock Picking (downloaded to my home-built 8086 computer) was my sole education. Combine my paltry picking education with a lack of practice locks and pathetic home brew lock picks, and the effort was doomed from the start. I could occasionally rake open a lock, but my pathetic skills were discouraging, and I abandoned my efforts. In retrospect, it was probably for the best. If I had my current abilities back then, it’s a fair guess that I would not have used them responsibly. Many years later (about a year ago), I happened across BosnianBill’s YouTube channel, and my fascination with lock-picking was reignited. After a couple weeks of watching his videos (and those of many other lock-picking YouTubers) during every spare moment, I decided to try picking again. I ordered a set of picks, and got to work.

[nozza36]

For me , it was when i was working at a live music venue in 2008 , the band members were always cabbaged and losing their keys , so had force a few doors (i was on the maintenance crew at the time ) i mentioned that i wished i could pick these door locks and someone mentioned that a former manager used to pick locks as a hobby , i thought wow ! me too ! two years later i had changed jobs and was made redundant , the unemployment office sent a few people to our workplace , offering retraining options for us , one of the courses was in locksmithing , i was well into it by then , so did the course , learnt very little on that course but gained enough confidence to make a go of it .
3 years later , i'd gotten in debt due to the lack of business , so got a job in a factory and continued with the locksmith thing part time til this day !

[UN-locked1]

I was watching YouTube I seen a guy open a suitcase padlock with paper clips so me and my friend tried failed then we watched the tutorial video hey presto it worked

After that kept watching videos so I started what Americans call dollar store padlocks I had no clue how to rake it was hit and miss then I bought a goso set because of my heavy hands broke picks moved on to klom navigator set then I started watching how to videos and have not looked back since been really amazing journey still lots to learn but I would say my skills are decent as I have a you tube channel as well where I have picked a lot of decent locks like assas my point is practice and learning of other pickers with patience takes you along way