Squire 440 - levers not binding
I opened the shackle and returned the bolt to its closed position so I could see what was happening to it (aswell as the first couple of levers inside). When I was applying tension I could feel a little movement, but I wanted to see if the bolt was actually moving or if I was hitting something else by mistake. It's definately moving, that's for sure. So, the tensioner is on the bolt... but the levers move freely as if no tension is being applied.
You'd assume this was an issue of tension amount. I know I did, anyway. I inserted a key with an allen wrench through it and used that to gauge the amount required to throw the bolt. It's not actually as much as I thought... so I tried using that amount, and adding a little as I went along, to try and feel for binding. I tried more than twice that amount just to see if I could get a lever to bind, and still nothing.
Makes no sense, right? So, I figured maybe the bolt wasn't being tensioned correctly after all... and of course I decided to tension it directly just to see. Keep in mind that the shackle is in the open position, and the bolt is closed, so I was able to insert a regular tensioner down where the shackle goes and push on the bolt that way. I put the original tensioner into the keyway to act as a base for my pick wire and started moving the levers as I was before, and it's the same story. I can see the first 2 moving, very smoothly I might add, and the other 2 give me the exact same feedback. What's going on?
How on earth can I be tensioning the bolt heavily and not getting a single lever to bind? I feel I have a pretty good understanding of what's going on in there and what should be happening, but this is really weird. No problems opening it with the key - and if it opens with a key, it should open without... so what's the problem? It's a standard 4 lever padlock and as far as I can tell it should be a nice easy job to pick.
Give me something, anything at all... I'm all out of ideas.