Welcome to our world exploring the Historical, Political and Technological aspects of Locks, Keys and Safes

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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Nov 2014
    Posts
    1
    Country: United States

    Default New Member looking for a little help

    Greetings! Nice place you have here!
    I have been lurking for a while and hope that as I learn more I can participate and contribute to many of the great conversations going on. This is my first post so be gentle
    I am hoping you could offer some advice on a bit of a mystery. First, some background:

    I live in upstate NY and am a member of private social club call The Fort Schuyler Club. It was founded in the late 1800's as a place for prominent businessmen (no women allowed) to meet, network and socialize. Now it is still a private club, but family friendly. They do a wonderful job serving terrific food and offer great events. They do so, in the original building which they have endeavored to maintain as close to the original club as possible. Upstairs they still have the original billiard room and library with a lot of the original texts and volumes. Additionally they still have some of the furniture. Which brings us to the mystery.

    Located outside the billiard room is cabinet of locked drawers (48 of them) mounted on a wall.
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    Each drawer is individually keyed. It is believed by the management that these drawers go back to the 20's or 30's and were used by individual members to store possessions of some sort, perhaps mail or messages or alcohol. No one knows. Members did not receive mail at the club, so the idea of these being mail boxes doesn't seem to work. The issue is that there are no keys and 3/4 of the drawers remain locked. They could be empty, then again, maybe not.

    The cabinet is beautiful piece and there is no desire to damage the cabinet or the locks, but we would like to see what is inside. Without cutting the bolts with a sawz-all or breaking the wood, there does not appear to find a way inside without damaging the wood. The construction is excellent quality and each drawer is self contained.
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    What I would like to do as a fundraiser for the club, is find a way to open each of the individually keyed drawers. We would then auction off the locked drawers with the proceeds going to charity. The winning bidder will get to keep the contents (if there are any) or could donate the contents to the club for historical purposes.

    The dilemma are the locks. Each one is unique. About 30 of them. All of the same type, but keyed individually. We have had a local locksmith look at the mechanism and he said he could not help us. Thus I decided to enlist the power of the internet. I am hoping one of the very smart people on this message board could share some insight or advice on the best way to open the locked drawers. If we cannot do it without damaging the mechanisms (drilling or cutting) then we will leave it as it is and have it be a club mystery. Any help you can provide would be appreciated. For your review, we removed one of the locks from an unlocked drawer and have provided some pictures. Thanks again for you help!
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  2. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2013
    Posts
    88
    Country: Australia

    Default

    Welcome to the forum!

    These are called lever locks and the specific style of the mechanism & flat steel keys they use are just like those used on safe deposit boxes.

    These locks can be opened non-destructively, by either picking or using a technique called impressioning.

    Impressioning has the added advantage of leaving you with a working key for the lock at the end of the process, however I'm not sure that you have a good chance of finding somebody willing and able to do this at an affordable price.

    Locksmiths generally employ destructive techniques when they need to open these locks, but if you are lucky, there will be a locksmith in your area who can pick them. You may find a member here can do it, or recommend somebody who is near you.

    If you don't find somebody to do the job through this forum, you can phone the locksmiths in your area & ask if they are able to pick safe deposit style lever locks.

    Sorry I can't be of more help,

    ...Mark

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Nov 2014
    Location
    Bulgaria
    Posts
    686
    Country: Bulgaria

    Default

    Take a careful look at the ones that are open. In my experience of such things it is likely that the locks are constructed with detainers rather than levers and there might well be a master key. If you get one of the ones which is open examine the detainers. One of them should have 2 notches. (Number them before you dismantle the lock- an ordinary lead pencil is fine for that).

    If you compare a few of the locks and find that they have one set of notches which are identical on all the locks then you have found the dimensions for the master key.

    Now I could be completely wrong. Maybe there isn't a master key system but that would be my first try.

    PM me by all means and I will give you another couple of ideas but not on a public forum. If you get a photo of the levers or detainers with some idea of scale that would help a lot.

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Dec 2007
    Location
    Odell Ne
    Posts
    581
    Country: United States

    Default

    Chubby, I'm not sure what you are referring to as a "Detainer", but I would call that lock a lever lock. They are pretty common on older wooden office desks. From looking at the pictures, I'm thinking 3,maybe 4 lever at most. They really aren't super hard to pick, but they do take a fair amount of time and skill. I would venture a guess that these locks are not mastered .
    s4drifter, at first glance, I was thinking these were possibly cigar humidors. But another possibility is a box to lock up their guns. I do like the idea of a place for each member to lock up his own bottle,but the drawer from the picture doesn't look that big. Interesting none the less. Back to the locks, there are lock sport groups that live to pick locks, but they are mostly into pin tumbler locks not lever locks, at least on this side of the pond. I think if you look for a locksmith, you are going to have to find an older one who's been in business for a long time to have the experience to pick these open. Good luck in your quest, I wish I lived closer, I'd love to give it a go. Mark
    Mark A. Billesbach

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Nov 2014
    Location
    Bulgaria
    Posts
    686
    Country: Bulgaria

    Default

    L & F made a couple of series of locks very similar to those. These are very common in UK on lockers etc. If you disassemble the lock to find there isn't a lever action- where the bolt stump goes through a gate, but a series of detainers (see 3G110 etc. by Chubb) where the action depends on aligning the notches on the back of the detainer. All the detainers are identical in one way- and that is the master profile. Each, however has one or more notches which aren't the same. The club member would get a key which opens to the differ whilst the club has a key which passes all of them with the identical notching.

    It was purely a guess. It might well not be set up like that. With the L & F series there was a master which fitted the entire series- ZA was one of these.

    As you say I can't imagine they are going to be particularly complex and anybody with a bit of perseverance, a can of WD 40 and some primitive picks should be able to get them open. Of course with them being on drawers gravity will take care of one part of the technique and make things easier!

    As a general point if the OP is reading this, I would suggest that you try and get them raked out. Old unused locks can be full of dirt. Then get a blast of WD 40 or similar on the levers now as that will certainly help whomever gets the fun job of picking at a later stage.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Nov 2005
    Location
    Seattle WA
    Posts
    1,327
    Country: United States

    Default

    They look like Eagle locks. 4 lever. There are still those out there that have codes for some of those. There are some with precut keys on rings at many locksmiths. You might take one or two of the locks around to a few locksmiths and see if they have a ring of keys that fit the locks you have out to establish the series. Once you find that person with a ring see what they want to come out and try the rest of the ring on the locked locks and copy of that key that works.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Nov 2005
    Location
    Seattle WA
    Posts
    1,327
    Country: United States

    Default

    Being your in NYC I know just the guy. I will send you the contact info.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    Nov 2014
    Location
    Bulgaria
    Posts
    686
    Country: Bulgaria

    Default

    With locks as simple as those appear to be it is always worth seeing if any keys you have, from old furniture, fit them.

  9. #9
    Join Date
    Nov 2005
    Location
    Seattle WA
    Posts
    1,327
    Country: United States

    Default

    The contact I sent deals heavy in cabinet locks. I call HIM when I have questions about desk locks or this type of thing. If he can't help when I am having problems then I have few choices left.... I do this for a living. Seth knows a great deal of history of locks.

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Nov 2009
    Location
    Maine
    Posts
    21
    Country: United States

    Default making a key

    It is fairly easy to make a key for the lock. This is a three or four lever lock. (I only see three but there could be a forth). All you need is a micrometer to measure the width and thickness and get as close to max as you can in brass. You need to get a set of lever picks from someone like HPC as impressioning is done with lock bolt retracted and unlocked. The portion on the tip is for the stump that retracts and extends the latchbolt and is usually full width or very close and about .050 wide. The four levers are also usually .050 wide. Now using smoking the blank or machine shop bluing turn the blank to try and lock it and observe the marks. I use an Ilco minute machine and my eye to cut about.020 deep Wire brush old bluing off and put new bluing on and repeat until marks no longer are present. Lock will close and open when cuts are close to proper depths.

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