Joseph Bramah patented his lock in 1784, it can be said that it was a milestone in the development of security locks. He had recognized the inherent weaknesses of previous locks and designed a lock which, he believed had none of the previous weaknesses. His patent lock is a masterpiece, with 18 sliders offering over 479 million key differs. This lock still exists and is still owned by the Bramah lock company in London.

bramah1787

The above image is supplied courtesy of Jeremy Bramah http://www.bramah.co.uk

The first recorded picking of the Bramah lock was not at the time of the Great Exhibition of 1851 as is generally thought, but some 30 years before in 1817 when an advertisement appeared offering an opening service to owners of locks who had lost their keys. An employee of Bramah's named Russell came up with a solution, he invented the false notches on the slides to frustrate the tentative process of picking to which the original locks were vulnerable.

The major upset for Bramah's reputation for impregnability came in 1851 when the famous American locksmith and lock - picker succeeded in picking the Bramah challenge padlock. It is worth noting that the lock was nearly 50 years old at the time, and certainly not the most up to date design. The process still took him some 45 hours, spread over 16 days. I plan to cover the whole lock controversy in the future.

Bramah locks are still made today, indeed Bramah's are the oldest constantly trading lock company in the world. The mechanism was widely copied, particularly in Europe. A number of variations also appeared, with varying degrees of success, but none of the copies have stood the test of time - only the original.

From around 1890 - 1920 Bramah's clients were some of the wealthiest people in the world, and for such customers Bramah supplied jewel case and master keys in gold.

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Bramah locks cannot be dated as accurately as Chubb locks for example, however well marked examples can provide an indication of when they were made.