Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/08/12/the-lockpicking-lawyer-makes-a.html
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15 Likes
Absolute legend. I love it.
16 Likes
The locksmith better be ready for some stern looks.
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Not exactly. The locksmith said he would refund the $75 he had charged to grind the lock. Of course, the ethical thing would be to also buy the owner a new lock to replace the one he destroyed.
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What i’d like to know is why does the locksmith consider the lockpicking videos to be BS. Is he implying that they’re staged? Or that the locks have been modified? I’m not sure what they mean by it. Lockpicking is well understood to be an inevitability and a locksmith of all people should know. There are no impossible locks that can’t be opened, just ones that present a bigger hassle.
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For a point of reference, you can buy a battery powered angle grinder for $10 with coupon.
And it turns out you don’t really need much in the way of skill to use it. Calling the locksmith is pointless if he’s going to just use an angle grinder.
This one does require an outlet to run unfortunately. If you want a cordless one it’s closer to $100, or $25 if you’re discounting the price the locksmith was going to charge. Of course there is also the convenience factor of not having to go out and buy an angle grinder, but I bet he was waiting around for some time for the locksmith to show up too, so it’s hard to say there.
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I think it means the locksmith has a lot more trouble picking locks than LPL does and thinks that LPL must be cheating. I mean nobody could be that good right? Nevermind that LPL wins locksport competitions. He’s truly world class.
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He’s refunding the $75 he charged for the job … but the dude is still out a lock.
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I laughed when the Lawyer had to cut the package open to show he could open the lock without cutting.
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To be fair, I’m not sure what good the lock would be with a lost key. Pick it every time you want to open it? Not very practical.
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Friends don’t let friends by “tools” at Harbor Freight.
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As the LPL mentions, picking locks is orthogonal to what many locksmiths do. Copying keys or making new ones from an existing lock is a different set of skills from opening a lock with tools that many locksmiths don’t carry. I’m not sure that makes sense, when I think about it. You’re not really a “smith” or an expert in the how and why of locks, but the equivalent of a parts-swapping technician following a script, never letting the customer know you really don’t know what you’re doing.
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The guy said he had a spare key at home, but was far from home at the time.
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I suppose that makes sense, i would assume that at least a good locksmith would know how to pick locks. Clearly the one mentioned in the video was just a glorified technician since he had to resort to a grinder after saying the lock was impossible to pick.
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Disappointing video. He rotated all the disks as far clockwise as they would go, he used the pick that he and BosnianBill made, he tensioned off disk one, got loads of little clicks, and maybe even went into a false gate, but he did not tell us any of this. That was all he had for us today, though, so that was some comfort.
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So, he should have called Uber, rather than a locksmith.
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I appreciated his mention that disc detainer locks are a different beast than the pin tumbler locks that most locksmiths are equipped to pick; and that he doesn’t fault any locksmith for not having the tools and skills.
If you’ve followed the LPL over the years, you know how much his skills have grown over time, and the specialty tools he’s personally helped develop are hardly commonplace. The custom disc detainer pick he showed off in this video is an absolutely amazing precision tool. It is to ordinary flag lockpicks as an angle grinder is to a dull hacksaw.
That said, I was a bit puzzled at the crack he made at the end about Malcom being likely to have trouble collecting from the locksmith— until I remembered the guy calling his videos BS. That certainly was a well-deserved serving of vinegar.
18 Likes
Yes. If you can make money by
- Charging handsomely for a service call,
- destroying locks with power tools, and
- charging handsomely to install new deadbolts, etc.
then spending your time picking locks is not cost-effective.
Please subscribe to my YouTube channel, The Angle-Grinding Accountant.
36 Likes
Yeah, I was wondering about that. Whatever it is, it makes me think he won’t accept this video as proof of anything…
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The value of ‘far’ was not defined, but perhaps he was a sentient human being able to consider this option and perhaps reject it because that might have outweighed the known cost of the locksmith.
Who knows?
Certainly you do not. But let’s make an assumption and credit the guy for perhaps considering a range of alternative options and still proceeding with a $75 locksmith bill and a destroyed lock, as the best option available to him at that point, shall we?
1 Like
