Old Mosler safe with locked inner door, what type lock.

[Hayekfa]

Hello:
I am new to this. I have a small safe collection but this is my first locked safe.
I thought that the unlocked outer door would give enough clues to figure out the inner door but after 6 hours of dialing and 6 hours reading I have not advanced much.
I am fairly sure that the two locks are not similar (outer is direct opening with fence pushed up from the bottom, (3) wheels)
Inner (locked) door does not seem to have any wheel drag variation when pressure is applied to the handle.
I have found lots of tips on this website and others, for me to try things.
If I was more confident of what type of lock I am working with I would be far ahead of where I am now.
I was beginning to think I had a friction fence type but now I have my doubts.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Ron

[Squelchtone]

Looks like you have a Mosler #17 / Yale 029-1/2 indirect drive 4 wheel lock on the inside door.





Nice gut shots of a Yale 25 1/2 indirect drive friction fence lock here, similar to your model https://keypicking.com/viewtopic.php?f= ... 47#p117396

More nice gut shots here: including an 029 1/2 https://www.lockpicking101.com/viewtopi ... 91#p483165

(Mosler and Yale made locks for each other, more Yale making for Mosler, I believe, kind of like the Chevy Camaro and Pontiac Firebird models looked very similar

hope this helps,
Squelchtone

[Hayekfa]

Thanks so much.
I will toil away.
Ron

[Oldfast]

Welcome Ron. I agree with Squelch... a Yale 029 1/2. What Mosler calls their #17 lock.

You'll find only 1 CP when turning LEFT (ccw). Should be somewhere around zero (0).
This one ain't for the faint of heart. Give it a go and get us some beautiful gut shots!

I am new to this. I have a small safe collection but this is my first locked safe.

If/when you have the time... we'd love to see some of the other safes you've found.

[Hayekfa]

Thanks for your input and help.
I am assuming that rotation patterns are opposite for indirect drive vs direct drive?
The most consistent resistance that I get is from 72-65, right or left.
Maybe a gear issue.
I have been using a stethoscope but may need a more advanced instrument.

This is the only safe that I have that is not commonplace.
I buy and sell machinery. Both of my warehouses’ have walk-in storage rooms with combination vault type doors.
I have picked up other safes because others did not want to move them.
It is the same with me and piano’s lately. I am up to 8 of them and have set out to learn how to play them.

I bought an entire industrial freestanding vault at a Corning plant years ago. It was for their platinum.
I took the whole 35,000# structure apart piece by piece and sold it. I cling tightly to the memories of the mistakes I made on the job that could have killed me, but did not.
Ron

[00247]

Good luck with the lock, your gonna need it. lol You need Oldfast's help. Your profile doesn't say where you are located. Michigan would be a huge plus. Post some pictures of the safe. I would love to have one with an inner chest. Never ran across one close enough to home.

[Janp]

I have here at home a door like you have. So I can take photo’s if you like.
Jan

[Oldfast]

....I am assuming that rotation patterns are opposite for indirect drive vs direct drive?....

That's correct. The added gear ultimately reverses things. But no matter....
What you're really after is the dialing sequence for this particular lock.
IF it is indeed set to a true 4# combo, dialing will be: LRLR L to Stop.

5x LEFT
4x RIGHT
3x LEFT
2x RIGHT
LEFT to solid stop (somewhere around 7-11)

Every time the # you're currently dialing touches
the opening index, is counted as 1x (one turn).

e.g. 3x LEFT to 14... means you'll stop on 14
the third time it aligns with the opening index

....I bought an entire industrial freestanding vault at a Corning plant years ago. It was for their platinum.
I took the whole 35,000# structure apart piece by piece and sold it. I cling tightly to the memories of the mistakes I made on the job that could have killed me, but did not.

Geez, that's interesting... and quite an undertaking I'd imagine. How long did this go on for?

[Hayekfa]

I appreciate the tips and comments.
I have not made much progress so far. Because the hum of lighting ballasts in the warehouse I have to turn off all the power to the building to work on this project, which I have to limit.
Working off -0- being the approximate CP, I am trying manipulation techniques that I have read about and trying to distinguish between the sound and feel at zero, versus the many other (gear?) sounds.
Another question I have is: since the outside door combination was 40-60-20 end at 35.
What is the likelihood that the inside door is nice even numbers also? That would make things simpler.
To answer a few questions, I am in Dayton Ohio. I picked this safe up in Middletown, very close to where it was manufactured.
The freestanding vault that described dismantling (2002?) was 9’ x 11’ x 8’. The door was a Mosler and weighed 3500#.
The walls, ceiling and flat roof were constructed of 9/16” steel plate. Built somewhat like a stud frame house, the “studs” were 4” steel channel iron. They were all fastened together with 1/2” countersunk screws. The panels weighed up to 800# each. I had a special tool welded to mate with the screw heads. The inside walls had to come down first. When you drop an 800# steel panel from vertical to horizontal, inside an all steel structure it makes a very loud noise.
Next come down the the inside ceiling panels. The roof panel fasteners were only accessible from the inside, as were the outside wall panels.
I shipped the door out, fastened upright to a very heavy skid. It traveled safely 1200 miles or so to Texas, but I was told by the buyer that thru impatient unloading, the door did a backflip off the side of the semi.
I never heard another word from the guy, and he never followed up to get our extensive dismantling photos and match marking diagrams for the structural components.

[MartinHewitt]

I don't have yet any experience with friction fence locks and will probably never get my hands on one with gears, so I can give you only guess work advice: I expect the contact point around 90 - 100. Feeling alone might be enough and then the background would then be no problem.

Simple combinations with numbers ending in 5 and 0 are not uncommon. If the known combination is that simple there is a good chance that the combination for the second lock is as simple unless a difference person was responsible for the second combination. With the assumption, that all numbers are dividable by 20 there are 625 possible combination which you could try. It might also be worth a try to test some simple variations of the outer combination, e.g. 40-40-60-20, 20-40-60-20, 40-60-20-80 or 40-60-20-40.

[madsamurai]

Hey Ron, I'm in West Carrollton... PM me if you want some help... I haven't spun a friction fence lock yet, but would sure like to give it a try.

[Squelchtone]

The movies and popular culture have fooled yet another member of the public. You do not open a safe by listening to clicks or any of that other nonsense with stethoscopes. That said, yes, I have an audio amp with big old radio DJ headphones and a microphone that magnetically attaches to the front of a safe door, but I have found it to be less awesome than expected.

You can leave the lights and heat on and put on a radio, pour a beer and start dialing, it will all be in the feel of your fingertips, and how good your eyes are. If anything a good bright LED light and perhaps one of those plastic visors which has magnifying lenses built into it so you can better see the dial like this https://www.sciplus.com/headband-magnif ... gLjwPD_BwE , or a USB web cam with a good macro lens pointing at your dial, and displayed on a laptop monitor so you can see the dial really up close to see where the Contact Point is as you approach it when turning the dial. Here is a site with very helpful tools http://analoghacking.com/vscale.html

MartinHewitt has a great idea in trying different variations of the outside door's combination numbers. Have you learned to pick up the wheels one by one and count them them to see if you have 3 wheels and a driver or 4 wheels and a driver? apologies if this was already covered in the thread.

hope this helps,
Squelchtone

[madsamurai]

So, I've been taking a swing at this for the last couple of days... for the record, Squelchtone, sound actually is about the only thing this lock will give away; there's very little available to feel. You can feel a reduction of the friction when turning left and the fence drops off the LCP into the drop-in area, and once you get a low point you can just barely start to hear the tap of the RCP as you go past it... you have to be moving to hear it, and can't stop on it, so it's very hard to measure... the fence falls off the LCP at 0 and taps the RCP somewhere between 5 and 7, but man is it hard to see exactly where, so I haven't been able to use that measurement to my advantage yet... I think it may become readable and useful as I get closer, but that remains to be seen.

So my strategy has been to find gates/low areas based on how solidly the fence falls into the drop-in (and if it makes a sound), and how much (if at all) I can hear the RCP. When it drops off the edge, it will either just roll on across and not feel like it drops and not make any sound, or it will feel like it drops but still not make a sound, or it will feel like it drops and make a sound as it hits against the wheels. Then follow that with how much of a hit you get on the RCP... the trick is keeping speed consistent when testing so get a reasonable comparison of that particular sound. If you're always going the same speed, a deeper drop-in will make a louder hit on the RCP, while a shallow drop-in will barely make any sound or just roll past it without any sound at all.

I think I've got the first two numbers, or maybe the first number and a low spot on w2, as I'm consistently hearing the RCP with my w3&4 scans now... this after about 7 hours or so. I can hear the RCP without headphones now most of the time, but still can't quite feel it enough for feeling to be useful. The dial itself is rubbing on one edge, so there's some extra friction and grabbiness there (and it squeaks) that isn't helping. I can confirm 4 wheels pick up, tho even that is very hard to feel... mostly can just feel the friction increasing as each wheel gets added into the motion, but there's no feedback from the flys hitting or anything. Also can confirm that the numbers I've figured so far don't seem to have any relationship with the combination of the outer lock. Hayekfa has me convinced the dial is connected directly to the drive cam and not an offset gear, since it indicates while turning left... I think that makes logical sense, but won't know for sure until it's open and we can take a look.

Oldfast's new thread on friction fence locks came up just at the right time and has, no doubt, kept me from going mad already... if I wasn't expecting most of this because of his write-up, I would be completely lost trying to treat this like a normal group 2. "Manipulate to begin manipulating" he says... no kiddin Still, I'm glad Hayekfa is letting me take a shot at it... He and his son are good people, and it's been fun getting to know them. Back at it tomorrow after work... wish me luck!

[MartinHewitt]

On my Sun 700 the turning resistance when going out of the drive cam gate is also very useful information. So I am sure you are on a good way to getting this cute beast open.

[Oldfast]

Chad! Win or lose, it's a real treat to tackle one of these.
Thanks for such a great description so far & can't wait to hear more!