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Six vexing Sargent cylinders

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pacifico

Newbie

Posts: 7

Joined: Wed Jan 28, 2015 3:23 pm

Location: Oregon

Post Fri Mar 27, 2015 3:16 pm

Six vexing Sargent cylinders

So a while back I got a pretty good deal on a lot of 9 Sargent cylinders with a mind to pick them all and then repin them for progressive practice locks and maybe a challenge lock. Well, the first two went fine, tricky at first but once I got with the right medium-firm tension I could feel everyone slip up past sheer nice and clearly while SPPing. Got the first one with a medium hook -- second one with a city rake. Took them apart and they had some mastering, I only took a picture of the guts in the first normal one, but they were quite similar:
first.png


But then there was the pile of six other Sargent cylinders sitting on my couch-side table taunting me. I tried to zip them, I tried to SPP for quite a while, broke off a home made bogota in one and never got anywhere. Was having a hard time even getting one or two sets. I was starting to think like "clearly these locks are cursed."

At some point I ended up looking down a keyway with a bright focused light and... the key pins didn't look right, not near as pointy as the others I had taken out but still bevelled on the edge (maybe worn I'd thought?) They started sapping my confidence as I resumed trying and then I returned to the comfort locks for a while. But then last night I picked up my trusty C rake and popped one, disassembled it and said "wellll W-T-F" when I saw the pins all layed out, picked up another one and used the same relaxed raking I'd done before and open! Disassemble and "wtf" again. Repeat four more times.
allsix.png


The first one had seven pins, but otherwise all six (seven pinner out-of-shot on top of the radio) had the same pins, same lengths, etc. There was less homogeneity in the springs (mixture of phosphor bronze and stainless steel in each lock)!
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jeffmoss26

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Sargent Mossberg
Sargent Mossberg

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Joined: Sun Apr 18, 2010 8:21 pm

Location: Cleveland, OH

Post Fri Mar 27, 2015 3:17 pm

Re: Six vexing Sargent cylinders

Looks like those are all 0-bitted, which means they would open with a blank.
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pacifico

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Posts: 7

Joined: Wed Jan 28, 2015 3:23 pm

Location: Oregon

Post Fri Mar 27, 2015 3:44 pm

Re: Six vexing Sargent cylinders

I wish I'd had a blank!
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GWiens2001

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Lock-Goblin-Gordon
Lock-Goblin-Gordon

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Joined: Thu Oct 25, 2012 9:05 pm

Location: Arizona, United States

Post Sat Mar 28, 2015 4:33 pm

Re: Six vexing Sargent cylinders

Or any straight piece of metal. The back of a half diamond works well.

Gordon
Just when you think you've learned it all, that is when you find you haven't learned anything yet.
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pacifico

Newbie

Posts: 7

Joined: Wed Jan 28, 2015 3:23 pm

Location: Oregon

Post Sun Mar 29, 2015 12:14 pm

Re: Six vexing Sargent cylinders

I guess my lesson from this is to not necessarily assume the pinning is tricky if it feels weird and to explore more "simple" options early on with locks of unknown provenance (all the seller knew was that these were from an institutional setting in LA).

I think it might be an interesting experiment to hand a 0-bitted lock to folks at the next local TOOOL meeting and see how they cope...

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