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Who wins? Just kidding.

Finally I have a couple of BEST cores and am suddenly attuned to all things IC related. So much variability, so many keyways, and so much skill to be acquired to conquer the almost limitless picking challenges. I feel really late to the party on all that BEST has to offer.

Anyway, I realized that I have had a Yale core all along in my pile of miscellaneous locks. It has two identical keys with bitting for six pins. Neither touch the seventh pin responsible for moving the retaining tab. That pin can be lifted with a pick when turning the key. The back of the plug has a little triangular notch cut out of it. If a control key were used part of the retaining tab would slide into that notch to prevent further turning of the plug just like the BEST.

What other IC systems are out there?

Here are some pictures for your enjoyment.

The two are totally different animals.
All SFIC use a separate shearline with control pins in each stack.

Schlage and Yale LFIC use a pin at the rear of the core for control (control key cut on a longer blank)
Sargent uses the middle 2 pins for control
Medeco and Corbin/Russwin use the middle 4 pins for control

Here are some pics:

Different beasts indeed.
I was pleased to find another core and thought the differences with BEST were neat, but I must admit in my mind the Yale is missing the "cool" factor. Must be the single shear line.

I don't see much talk about LFICs around here, outside of buy/sell/trade. Is it a "cool" factor thing, are they less prevalent, is the LFIC padlock market nonexistent, or something else completely? Or is BEST truly the best?

Take care!

They look like fun, I have only had a chance to pick best cores so far.

I don't see a ton of LFIC in the wild, but my college did have some older Corbin stuff still in use. Most people seem to use SFIC since it's independent of brand.

How about this? A DOM dimple LFIC. Althought it is the same size as a SFIC and does fit into a best padlock, it is not made for the SFIC system. The pins in it are some of the smallest I have ever seen.

Thats a cool IC.

Dom sexy