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Hey guys,
So I've been on an Ebay and local auction lock buying spree. Building up my collection and preparing for an upcoming project as well as YouTube channel. This weekend I landed three 1970's American Lock 600 series padlocks, they spent their life on the railroad. Two are in pretty decent condition and one is pretty rough. None came with keys, one came unlocked, and the pins/springs seem to be in working order on all of them. However there is a good bit of mud and dirt in the keyways interfering with things.

I cleaned them up as usual, I've been focused on accumulating American Locks the past couple weeks, adore them. I have a routine cleaning/restoring process but the problem i'm running into here is taking them apart. The two that are locked are giving me trouble picking them open due to the gunk inside, i'm working hard to clean out the keyways enough to pick them open. However, I can't even get the one that came unlocked apart.

I've read some information on here that talks about a pin inside the shackle hole, needing to be depressed to release the core. However I can find no such pin. The locks are dated 1973, 74 & 79, all 600 series. I'll include photos below, but what I can see is this. Inside the shackle hole, where you would usually find a screw in the modern ones, there is indeed a hole there. Inside that hole you can see part of a mechanism. The part you can see through the hole looks like a half moon. You can see this very well in the pictures below, under and beyond that half moon bit there are other bits that hard to make out due to the dirt and grease.

If anyone can properly instruct me on how to disassemble this beast so I can clean it up that would be great. As for the other two, hopefully I can manage to get them picked despite the grime up inside so I can clean them out as well and practice on them the right way, lol. I ordered some standard keyblanks for a couple Americans I have here, and some Junkunc blanks just for these, from what I can ascertain that's what they came with so that's what I wanted them to have. I look forward to keying them up.

Thanks for your time, here are the photos.

Would have to check, but think you put a tool in that hole, then turn the key. That will push back a spring-loaded part that holds the core in place, like the old Chicago padlocks.

Gordon

I have a Series 600, no date code, with a screw under the shackle...interesting!

Indeed Jeff! Ill let you know what the other two have when I get them open. Picking on them as we speak. The one that is open pictured above is the 63.

One of these has the alphabetical date code. The other two have three numerical digits that appear to be the date codes only not coded into letters.

G, is it a special tool, can I replicate?

The few that I have, have a pin which holds the core in. You use a screw driver or pick or anything to depress the pin in which results in the core coming out. I dont see a pic there. Did you try to push the core out as is? Maybe that pin is lost/damages or never popped out when it was serviced last and someone used glue to hold it in.

There are pictures above, these don't have pins. Pushing yhem out is a no. I think G is right about a tool. These are definitely different.

Does anyone know how to remove these cores that don't use the pin or screw methods? Someone must.

Also G what about that tool?

Phoneman explained how to open these a while back. viewtopic.php?f=116&t=7838&start=15