Just one month: LockCon 2012 (Nicholasville, Kentucky)
Just one more month before LockCon. This is gonna be cool!
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If heaven exists, is it for us mortal lockpickers. And in one month from now it will be held (July 17/18/19)!
LockCon 2012 in the US
After a number of very successful LockCon conferences organized in Europe, this time the circus will travel to the US.
It is never easy to find a good spot for this kind of event but this year we found the best possible location: the headquarters of in Nicholasville, Kentucky.
The LSI facility is just perfect for LockCon because of the many areas where the LSI instructors normally on how to . These rooms will offer the right atmosphere for our hands-on sessions and championships. And of course there is the in-house (that offers napkins so you do not drool over their )
One thing that I would like to point out is that we have the same agreement with LSI as with Peter Field. Both LSI and Mr. Field will not talk to us about how to open locks. LSI only lets us use the facility on certain hours of the day and Peter Field will only talk about locks in general (in a very nice and detailed way I might add). As he said before: “I am here to talk about locks. How to open them is up to you ….”.
The World Championships of lockpicking, Impressioning and manipulation
Besides many presentations (by Peter Field and others) and hands on sessions (spectacular!) LockCon will also host the first world championships of lockpicking, safe manipulation and impressioning! There will be people coming from all over the place (to name a few: Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, UK and of course the US) to see who will be the fastest lockpicker in the world. And there are very nice prices to win as our sponsors are known to be very generous. I am curious how people like and will do against the in the US.
Want to join or compete?
There are still a few seat available although getting in may not be as easy as it sounds. We do have a rather strict policy of having to know you before letting you in. Having said that, we can always be persuaded if you have a kick-ass presentation to give on lock-related topics. Memebers of Aloa and/or Savta are also welcome to (try to) register.
You can always or visit our and see how far you get.
Hope to see you all in one month from now in Kentucky!
publication01.07.2012 00:50
Picking 17th century cultural heritage locks
Picking open 'one out of four' 17th century treasure boxes in some sort of museum. Pretty special if you consider nobody alive knows what is inside! The remaining three boxes will be opened when we return from LockCon.
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If the key to something you do not use every day is lost, it can take a little while before is called. In this case it took them a couple of hundred years to find us!
But that is ok. I like mysteries, especially if I can help solving them. Last week was good for mystery solving and there still are to be solved.
We were invited into some sort of museum where they had four 17th century treasure-boxes without key. They did send that allowed me to do some (via on twitter).
When we arrived we inspected the boxes and padlocks with endocsopes and decided they could probably be with simple steel wire bent . The wire then .
In a little while we did mange to open a number of and one of the boxes.
Currently are waiting to be opened and at least one of them contains a number of ‘heavy objects’. This is interesting, especially if you consider the boxes were used to in ships.
Jord was asked to make a for the and that is quite a task with the . Hopefully I can make a blackbag posting out of that too as it is an interesting process to create such a key. (more nice keys on )
The exact location of the remaining boxes has to be kept secret for now not to give anyone any ideas. There will be a follow up soon (after ) and hopefully we can solve some more mysteries then.
publication13.08.2012 17:11
Impressioning champion … of the world?
How I won the US impressioning games and became fourth at the lockpick games. And a little on how LockCon went.
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There was a little confusion how to call the championships at LockCon. Should we call them US open or
To keep a long story short: I the first . And it was a close call.
The close call was whether or not I would participate. I did not prepare and did not even bring gear (suitcases were full of heavy stuff anyway). It was my new friend who persuaded me to participate and generously gave me his file. And gave me his spare handle. What followed was me winning . And in the third round I was nicely and to open the six pin lock in 60 minutes. We are all happy goes .
Even though I won of , I am not really much of a competitive player. For me it is more important to be able to open a wide variety of locks in a decent time. This is what I teach at and rely on as a locksmith at But I can not deny it is a good feeling to win.
LockCon 2012 LockPick championships … of the world?
Torsten Quast won the lockpicking games, followed by Julian Hardt and Jord Knaap.
I ended sharing the fourth place with . And that is a pity because after a long number of elimination rounds both Julian and I were the only ones who were not defeated. But then I got into a pool of three people and lost, followed by a battle to the finals with Ray. And we both any of the ending us both at the fourth place.
All fun aside, Torsten seemed to like the idea of being the ‘unofficial’ world champion lockpicking. The Toool board had long discussions on how to organize the first “official” world-championships of LockPicking and Impressioning in the future (in corporation with other sportgroups like SSDeV, Fools etc). The way we envision it is that every locksport and (possibly) locksmith community in the world should organize their own championships and the winners of each of these competitions will be sponsored to fly to LockCon for the first official world championships. But don’t hold your breath for it to happen soon.
What else happened at LockCon?
Besides the for all went fine.
LockCon was held at the A with its own Good for ours of at . There were and all over the place.
We organized some on . At the we learned they had the ultimate safe to
Lots of was done at the late night parties. People would their tool , reverse engineer , make and drink till
Just google for lockcon and find lots of full of nice pictures.
Thanks everyone for making LockCon possible and hope to see you soon at a new event!
publication15.11.2012 18:40
International Lockpick party in Hamburg Dec. 28
invitation to lockpicker party in Hamburg December 28
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At the end of the year there always is the CCC congress (see for details). Very informative and worth your time.
This year will be in Hamburg (instead of Berlin like previous years).
Since Hamburg is the city where locksport more or less was born, it is the ideal place to organize an international lockpicker party. On December 28th all lockpickers are welcome at the party.
And this weekend there is the . I am curious they will use!
Hope to see you there!
publication22.11.2012 17:11
Czech lockpick championships
short blogposting on the Czech lockpick championships
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Just a short blogposting this time to get me starting blogging again :)
Last weekend had a great time near Prague at the Czech lockpick championships. The Czech are friendly, well organized and have a of .
Our German friends from SSDeV kept scores on their .
Below a small video of one of the rounds in ‘freestyle’. Many electronic pickguns and very fast opening times.
publication03.12.2012 21:10
Electro picks, lockpick competition and back from Poland
New Toool competition lock and the smallest, most powerful, most silent and (unfortunately) the most expensive electro-pick on my wishlist.
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Interesting news. The division just released the locks for .
It does contain some interesting locks. A lot of people donate to the collection and are locks in - and .
Not all locks have been identified by Jos Weyers (who photographed all the locks). If you can help him identify some of the unknown locks that would be appreciated.
At the competition only manual hand picks are allowed. Electro-picks are not allowed. If they were, I know what tool to use. By far the is made by .
I spoke with one of the developers at the in Poland last weekend and got some impressive demo’s. They make the smallest, most powerful, most silent and (unfortunately) the electro-pick on my wishlist.
intact-noodopening.nl logo contest
Need help finding the right logo for my locksmith venue.
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As some of you might know I run a small 24/7 locksmith in the Amsterdam area called
The idea behind intact is to open , cars and without damaging the lock. Basically I am being paid to practice in the field what I teach in my classes.
Truth is that at this moment not a whole lot of work is coming trough. And I outsource most of it since I simply do not have much time.
Never the less I decided I needed a good logo for this venue. Instead of annoying my standard logo designer I took another route: putting it for bid on . So far there are three designs thar stick out.
Can you help me by for a locksmith that specializes in non-destructive entry?
Thanks in advance!
publication05.08.2013 19:04
Dates for LockCon 2013: November 22/23/24
Mark your calendars, we have a date for LockCon 2013. The weekend of November 22/23/24 we will be in the good old youth hostel in Sneek for another edition of LockCon. More information can be found here and the request for talks / presentations is open! One of the topics will be me resigning as [...]
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Mark your calendars, we have a date for .
The weekend of November 22/23/24 we will be in the good old for another edition of LockCon.
More information can be found and the request for talks / presentations is open!
One of the topics will be me resigning as president of Toool. At the OHM conference Walter and Jos became the new Toool president and vice president.
The reason for me leaving is that I am currently very busy with my full-time job. More about that later. First we have to get going. If you want to visit or give a presentation please email us at [email]registration@lockcon.com[/email]
publication13.11.2013 19:01
LockCon Preliminary schedule
Finally: the preliminary LockCon schedule!
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This year’s theme for lockcon is the “makers view”. We have some of the best speakers in the field and it promises to be interesting as ever before.
On Friday people are welcome in the hostel from 15:00 on and dinner is served at 19:00.
Around 20:30 there is the opening speech followed by a ‘who is who’.
Saturday breakfast is served between 08:00 and 09:00
09:00 – 12:00 Peter Field will give one of his famous presentations about high-security locks
12:00 – 13:00 Lunch
13:00 – 15:00 Prioritizing Pick Designs by Christina Palmer. An illustrated presentation and open discussion of picks and turners design.
16:00 – 17:00 ******* (No Press: presenter asked not to be mentioned on public site)
17:00 – 17:30 Warren Rockley: UAP locks, their security features and how to pick them.
17:30 Dinner
20:00 Impressioning championships. Abus was kind to sponsor the event again with locks and blanks.
Sunday
08:00 – 09:30 breakfast
09:30 – 11:00 Ken Person will demonstrate some of his opening tools and talk about their design.
11:30 Start “Dutch Open” lockpick championships
12:30 – 13:30 lunch
13:30 – 15:30 finals “Dutch Open”
16:00 Closing ceremonies
17:00 Diner
There will also be a Toool memberships meeting (ALV) on Friday. At this meeting the new Toool president Walter Belgers and vice President Jos Weyers will inform the members about the way Toool-NL will be run.
We are almost fully booked btw. If you did not receive a mail from Jos a couple of days ago please make sure to mail [email]registration2013@lockcon.com[/email] to confirm your stay!
publication17.12.2013 08:04
Transporting safes
Jord knaap (kjs-tools) came out with a clever solution to transport safes and vaults. With the KJS safe-transporter one person can transport safes. And there is no need for specialized trucks/vans. Easy does it!
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Jord Knaap from KJS tools has come out with a new line of products in his .
With one of his products he solves a problem that is encountered by safe-technicians around the world: how to transport a heavy safe with just one person? Or how to transport a heavy safe without a specialized hydraulic van?
Jord solved this with his . And I really like it a lot!
With this simple tool just one person can transport a heavy safe. As you can see in the video it’s pretty simple to load and unload and transport it. The nice thing is that you can also use it for transporting other objects the size of a euro-pallet.
Jord does not have all his tools available online. If you are a safe-tech (or high-end locksmith) and want his new ’2014 catalog’ I suggest .
publication09.05.2014 21:14
End of an era
Final post on the blackbag site. So long and goodbye.
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Becoming the really paved the way to become a . After that I left my comfort zone and signed a contract with in 2012. I am one of their and assist them in any way I can (working from Amsterdam). So far it has been a dream come true.
Besides the work for Lockmasters Technologies, Inc I run lock-related from Amsterdam (and on location in Europe) with my private company .
Last but not least my company opens , and in a . In reality I forward a lot of the intact support calls to locksmith colleagues that do have time to take the job. So working for Intact has my lowest priority but is a nice way to keep my skills sharp and stay in touch with what happens in the real world.
I could never have come this far without the help of my friends in the locksport community. I am very fortunate with the friends I have made over the years. And I am happy to see that others have made the step to the lock industry as well. Just to name two: Han Fey and Dr. Torsten Quast are now working for Assa Abloy, the largest lock manufacturer in the world. It is my believe many “lock enthusiasts” will follow…
I decided to transfer my Toool (NL) leadership position in 2013. New Toool president Walter Belgers and vice president Jos Weyers are perfect for the job and have my full trust and support.
One of the things they did is to extend LockCon by one full day. The dates for the three day event are: September 19/20/21. This is the weekend before the security show in Essen (to encourage international travelers to come). The extra day will be used for more presentations and workshops and I am already looking forward to attend it. The LockCon request for talks / presentations is open.
The end of an era
All good things come to an end and so does this weblog. This is the last post before it closes.
This does not mean I will be completely off the radar. Lockmasters Technologies, Inc just started a that I am contributing to. I am sure you will some of the there.
And there is the regularly updated for you to visit and “like” (thank you!).
I have not made up my mind what to do with BlackBag’s content. If you want to capture any of the information: the blog will be at least up until September and I will make a decision after that.
Thank you for your interest and support over the years.
Feel free to for anything related to locks and security.
Blackbag signing out
publication25.11.2014 03:23
What brand of lock is this?
At the Toool evening, Maurice from kluisspecialist.nl showed us one of the locks in his collection. It is a really interesting lock. I’ve never seen a lock with such a key before. And it’s old. But that’s about all that we know. Do you know more? Please leave a comment. […]
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At the Toool evening, Maurice from kluisspecialist.nl showed us one of the locks in his collection. It is a really interesting lock. I’ve never seen a lock with such a key before. And it’s old. But that’s about all that we know. Do you know more? Please leave a comment.
The keys are in a protective metal holder and they have 5 hollow pins.
The lock is opened by inserting the key fully and the retracting it. The mechanism is such that closing the lock after it has been opened, resets the lock mechanism. On the key you can see a horizontal stripe, this is a metal strip that, when removed, allows the key to be re-keyed.
Here’s a short video of the lock in action:
publication25.11.2014 03:23
Lever Locks
At the Toool evening, we had a visit of Maurice and Sander from . Having 20 years of experience opening safe locks, Maurice has created a lovely collection of lever locks. All locks have been given a plexiglass shield so you can see the inner working. Among it are some interesting ones, like one from […]
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At the Toool evening, we had a visit of Maurice and Sander from . Having 20 years of experience opening safe locks, Maurice has created a lovely collection of lever locks. All locks have been given a plexiglass shield so you can see the inner working.
Among it are some interesting ones, like one from a church, with letters on the wheel and a nice rekeyable lock.
And here’s some more.
Thanks Maurice and Sander!
publication25.11.2014 03:23
LockCon 2014 – the aftermath
Wow – we are all still buzzing with energy after this years’ LockCon! With a fully packed program spanning three days, there was something to learn and do for everyone. People showed up from all over the world, making new friends, discussing new locks and lock opening techniques and just having a good time in […]
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Wow – we are all still buzzing with energy after this years’ LockCon! With a fully packed program spanning three days, there was something to learn and do for everyone. People showed up from all over the world, making new friends, discussing new locks and lock opening techniques and just having a good time in general.
An important part of LockCon is the Toool Dutch Open Championships in lockpicking and impressioning. And, thanks to Jord, this year we also had a lever lock opening competition.
The impressioning competition was won by Manfred B
publication25.11.2014 03:23
LockCon 2014 addition
Not many people have experience in opening pump locks (locks using a push key). However, one of the guests at LockCon 2014 has ample experience. And: he has built his own tool to open these locks. This is what it looks like: At LockCon, you will be able to see the tool in action with […]
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Not many people have experience in opening (locks using a push key). However, one of the guests at LockCon 2014 has ample experience. And: he has built his own tool to open these locks. This is what it looks like:
At LockCon, you will be able to see the tool in action with live commentary from the maker. You can see a 17-second sneak preview from the conference here:
publication25.11.2014 03:23
LockCon’14 is “ON”! (It giet oan!)
In a couple of days Toool will host the international LockCon conference in Sneek. If you planned on spending the Thursday-night at the Hostel, but haven’t stated so when registering: DO register! Spaces are limited and going fast. Also some of the “old-timers” seem to think they don’t have to register anymore to get in. […]
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In a couple of days Toool will host the international LockCon conference in Sneek.
If you planned on spending the Thursday-night at the Hostel, but haven’t stated so when registering: DO register! Spaces are limited and going fast.
Also some of the “old-timers” seem to think they don’t have to register anymore to get in. But as our maximum numbers are set, we kinda need a headcount beforehand.
If you haven’t already, register! If you didn’t get the registration link, please send an e-mail to lockcon2014-registration at toool.nl.
You wouldn’t want to miss out on all this goodness:
the opening will be at 19 Sep 10:15
the closing will be at 21 Sep 16:00 after which we will have dinner.
Jaakko will talk about the process of tool-building (looking for weaknesses, choosing materials and the actual build) Alexandre has an innovative way of doing dual-component impressioning Michael will give a talk about locks in German alarm systems
there will be a safe manipulation workshop, lecture and championship Jord will host a workshop on working with some new safe opening tools Legion303 will take us through the process of building lock picks Rob will do a fun talk about lockpicking in movies
on Friday night we’ll try something we have never done at LockCon before (and can’t yet tell you about) -No Press-
datagram will host his famous tamper workshop decoder will shed some light on the mediahit that is 3d printing of restricted blanks Marnix will bring some 3D printers, so we can get some hands-on results Legion303 will show us how to defeat the cyberlock Jaakko will show his new safecracking tool
we are very grateful we will host our annual impressioning championship on C83 cylinders donated by ABUS.
Alexandre will show us a technique to manipulate and decode Disec locks
And off course we will be hosting the annual Dutch Open Lockpicking Championships.
Ample reason to head to Sneek it seems.* See you in a couple days.
publication25.11.2014 03:23
Printing your own nylon bumpkeys
This is amazing. Our German friend ‘Decoder’ just came out with a video showing the first 3D printed bumpkey (made of nylon). Here is the youtube video:
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This is amazing. Our German friend just came out with a showing the first 3D printed bumpkey (made of nylon).
Here is the youtube video:
publication25.11.2014 03:23
3D printing of keys
Companies have been offering 3D-printing services for keys for a while now. Apparently, not everybody is aware of this, so when Jos talked about this at HOPE, it caused a bit of a stir. Wired wrote an article about it that you can read at . The article describes professional key duplication services. A few […]
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Companies have been offering 3D-printing services for keys for a while now. Apparently, not everybody is aware of this, so when Jos talked about this at HOPE, it caused a bit of a stir. Wired wrote an article about it that you can read at
The article describes professional key duplication services. A few weeks ago, TOOOL member Tom decided to spend an afternoon to see if he could make a model of a standard key to be printed on a cheap consumer grade 3D printer. Here is the first result:
And here’s a picture of two printed keys with an original. The cuts were measured and printed.
Here you see the key is working, although you can feel you have to be careful not to apply too much force.
The thing the consumer grade printer has most problems with, it first printing separate blobs of plastic that only connect to the rest of the key as the profile is being printed. This means the key had to be lightly filed after printing, to make it operate the lock.
publication25.11.2014 03:23
TOOOL at HOPE X
The tenth Hackers On Planet Earth conference has just been held in New York, USA. One of the topics has been lockpicking and people from TOOOL-US as well as Jos from TOOOL-NL have been demonstrating the sport. He can be seen on the right in the picture that Hackaday put online at . The official […]
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The tenth Hackers On Planet Earth conference has just been held in New York, USA. One of the topics has been lockpicking and people from TOOOL-US as well as Jos from TOOOL-NL have been demonstrating the sport. He can be seen on the right in the picture that Hackaday put online at . The official homepage of HOPE is .
Update: video (over 3 hours!) at
publication25.11.2014 03:23
Dates for LockCon 2014: September 19/20/21
The weekend of September 19/20/21 we will be in the good old youth hostel in Sneek for another edition of LockCon. More information can be found here and the request for talks / presentations is open! This year, we have three full days, so there is more time for interesting lectures and workshops. Of course, […]
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The weekend of September 19/20/21 we will be in the good old for another edition of LockCon.
More information can be found and the request for talks / presentations is open!
This year, we have three full days, so there is more time for interesting lectures and workshops. Of course, the Dutch Open lockpicking and impressioning championships will also be held during LockCon.
publication25.11.2014 03:23
Start of a new era!
Since July, 2006, Barry Wels has been publishing great stuff about locks and security on his blog, Blackbag. May, 2014, he decided to stop. Barry Wels is founder and long-time president of Toool, The Open Organisation of Lockpickers. In August, 2013, he stepped down from the Toool board to focus on his new company. I […]
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Since July, 2006, Barry Wels has been publishing great stuff about locks and security on his blog, Blackbag. May, 2014, he decided to stop.
Barry Wels is founder and long-time president of Toool, The Open Organisation of Lockpickers. In August, 2013, he stepped down from the Toool board to focus on his new company. I am the new president of Toool since then.
Barry has very kindly given Toool the opportunity to take over blackbag. We will be trying to get some interesting lock-related content on here in the near future! And there’s more good news: all the old content will remain available.
I would like to thank Barry for his outstanding work and hope to see all of you around on Blackbag in the years to come.
The first Toool meeting in Groningen
Toool Netherlands members have been gathering in Amsterdam and Eindhoven for years. But for some, the distance to either places is too big. Jord Knaap lives in Groningen and he is one of the members that is far away from both places. The good news is: he decided to take upon him to host Toool-meetings […]
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Toool Netherlands members have been gathering in Amsterdam and Eindhoven for years. But for some, the distance to either places is too big. Jord Knaap lives in Groningen and he is one of the members that is far away from both places. The good news is: he decided to take upon him to host Toool-meetings in Groningen! So with that, Toool is strategically placed throughout the Netherlands.
The first meeting will be held coming saturday, January 24th, starting at 17:00 hours at , .
Jord is planning to have monthly meeting to start with. If you are interested, please go to the first meeting. This way, you can discuss what the best date and place is to have the meetings. Jord would like to know who is coming, so please also mail him in advance at [EMAIL="jord@knaapjunior.nl"]jord@knaapjunior.nl[/EMAIL]. Bring some locks if you like, and spread the word if you have friends that would like such a thing as well!
publication26.01.2015 08:03
The first Toool meeting in Groningen – aftermath
The first Toool meeting in Groningen was a succes! The people from Germany had already created a bypass tool for the Mauer Combi B. This is it: And here you can see it in action: One of the attendees was showing his homebrew snap tool: The local television crew (RTV Noord) was also present. They […]
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The first Toool meeting in Groningen was a succes!
The people from Germany had already created a bypass tool for the Mauer Combi B. This is it:
And here you can see it in action:
One of the attendees was showing his homebrew snap tool:
The local television crew (RTV Noord) was also present.
publication13.03.2015 11:11
Adventures with an old time-clock
Sometimes, the people who visit Toool are there for a specific reason. They are collectors and have in their possession an old apparatus with a locking mechanism but no key. They come so we can try to open the thing without destroying it. As you can read elsewhere on blackbag, we’ve opened quite a few […]
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Sometimes, the people who visit Toool are there for a specific reason. They are collectors and have in their possession an old apparatus with a locking mechanism but no key. They come so we can try to open the thing without destroying it. As you can read elsewhere on blackbag, we’ve opened quite a few WWII crypto-devices for instance.
Yesterday, somebody visited us with an old time-clock. The lock looks simple indeed, but took considerable time to open, revealing the interesting mechanics on the inside. The owner was happy and so were we!
publication16.03.2015 22:40
Gendarm lock
Jos showed up with an interesting lock. It’s a German lock for a cash drawer. Instead of using a key, you need to press several levers to open it. If you press the wrong ones, an alarm goes off (all mechanic!). One lever was not operational. Jord fixed it and made a small movie demonstrating […]
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Jos showed up with an interesting lock. It’s a German lock for a cash drawer. Instead of using a key, you need to press several levers to open it. If you press the wrong ones, an alarm goes off (all mechanic!). One lever was not operational. Jord fixed it and made a small movie demonstrating the lock.
publication24.07.2015 02:37
Jos wins the German impressioning championship
The German Impressioning Championships took place in Kassel, Germany on June 27th. In the first round, Jos was the only one who managed to open their lock within an hour. Jos opened in 5 minutes and 20 seconds, which means that he is the champion and the trophy is back in the Netherlands. The locks […]
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The German Impressioning Championships took place in Kassel, Germany on June 27th.
In the first round, Jos was the only one who managed to open their lock within an hour. Jos opened in 5 minutes and 20 seconds, which means that he is the champion and the trophy is back in the Netherlands.
The locks were, as always, Abus C83/73 cylinders. New this year was the use of special pins inside the locks. Here you see a few of them:
Jos is looking forward to the next international games, which will be held in Seattle, USA.
Lockpick village
Toool regularly gives lectures and workshops. This month, we were at the OWASP-meeting and Hack in the Box. Here you can see Einstein overlooking the table.
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Toool regularly gives lectures and workshops. This month, we were at the OWASP-meeting and Hack in the Box. Here you can see Einstein overlooking the table.
publication24.07.2015 02:37
Self-picking cylinder
Getting practice locks that have no security pins, for new lockpickers, is not that easy here in the Netherlands. But sometimes, cheap “dollar stores” will have batches of cheap locks that are very easy to pick. Martin found such a lock in a store in Belgium. The funny thing? The lock had actually picked itself […]
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Getting practice locks that have no security pins, for new lockpickers, is not that easy here in the Netherlands. But sometimes, cheap “dollar stores” will have batches of cheap locks that are very easy to pick.
Martin found such a lock in a store in Belgium. The funny thing? The lock had actually picked itself during transport, probably due to vibrations, inside the packaging!
So that’s great news. We now have self-picking locks…
publication24.07.2015 02:37
Euro-Locks
April 24th, a delegation of Toool visited the Euro-Locks factory in Bastogne, Belgium. Sales manager Jean-Louis Vincart welcomed us and talked us through the history of Euro-Locks, the factories and products. After that, we visited the actual production facility. The Bastogne factory is huge and almost all of their products are completely build here. We […]
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April 24th, a delegation of Toool visited the Euro-Locks factory in Bastogne, Belgium.
Sales manager Jean-Louis Vincart welcomed us and talked us through the history of Euro-Locks, the factories and products. After that, we visited the actual production facility. The Bastogne factory is huge and almost all of their products are completely build here. We spoke with the R&D people creating new molds, saw molten zamac, steel presses, chrome baths, assembly lines and packaging, so everything from the raw metal to the finished product. It’s interesting to see so many products (both in range of products and the actual number of produced locks) being made here, and having no stock of the finished product.
Thanks to Eric and Martin for making the visit possible.
publication10.10.2015 11:12
Maverick lock
I had this Maverick lock in my collection for a long time. At a Toool meeting, I was playing around and decided to try and open it. Martin then suggested he make it into a cutaway version, which he did. I’ve made a short video to demonstrate how it works.
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I had this Maverick lock in my collection for a long time. At a Toool meeting, I was playing around and decided to try and open it. Martin then suggested he make it into a cutaway version, which he did. I’ve made a short video to demonstrate how it works.
Just one month: LockCon 2012 (Nicholasville, Kentucky)

Just one more month before LockCon. This is gonna be cool!
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If heaven exists, is it for us mortal lockpickers. And in one month from now it will be held (July 17/18/19)!
LockCon 2012 in the US
After a number of very successful LockCon conferences organized in Europe, this time the circus will travel to the US.
It is never easy to find a good spot for this kind of event but this year we found the best possible location: the headquarters of in Nicholasville, Kentucky.
The LSI facility is just perfect for LockCon because of the many areas where the LSI instructors normally on how to . These rooms will offer the right atmosphere for our hands-on sessions and championships. And of course there is the in-house (that offers napkins so you do not drool over their )
One thing that I would like to point out is that we have the same agreement with LSI as with Peter Field. Both LSI and Mr. Field will not talk to us about how to open locks. LSI only lets us use the facility on certain hours of the day and Peter Field will only talk about locks in general (in a very nice and detailed way I might add). As he said before: “I am here to talk about locks. How to open them is up to you ….”.
The World Championships of lockpicking, Impressioning and manipulation
Besides many presentations (by Peter Field and others) and hands on sessions (spectacular!) LockCon will also host the first world championships of lockpicking, safe manipulation and impressioning! There will be people coming from all over the place (to name a few: Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, UK and of course the US) to see who will be the fastest lockpicker in the world. And there are very nice prices to win as our sponsors are known to be very generous. I am curious how people like and will do against the in the US.
Want to join or compete?
There are still a few seat available although getting in may not be as easy as it sounds. We do have a rather strict policy of having to know you before letting you in. Having said that, we can always be persuaded if you have a kick-ass presentation to give on lock-related topics. Memebers of Aloa and/or Savta are also welcome to (try to) register.
You can always or visit our and see how far you get.
Hope to see you all in one month from now in Kentucky!