mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#16

Post by admin »

In 20+ years of safe ownership covering various models from cheap Stack-On safes (not cabinets, but safes), to inexpensive Cannon safes, to higher end safes - every single one has had an electronic keypad lock and I've never once had any failures of the locks. I still have my very first Stack-On safe (12 gun model?) and have had zero issues with it - and it gets opened on a daily basis.

While you hear of electronic locks failing more often than mechanical dials, I think there are considerably more electronic locks out there on safes, so it would be expected to hear more about them failing.

Hopefully you get your safe and lock fixed - it would certainly not make me happy if I didn't trust a safe to open when needed.


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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#17

Post by QuangTri »

Drmark wrote: September 14th, 2022, 2:18 pm Mechanical s*** will fail. However, years ago there was this thing called "quality control".
Mechanisms with springs are prime examples if the springs are highly stressed. A safe lock should not be such an application. My suspicion here is the spring that keeps the "arm" or pawl following the tumbler. I got it to engage by bumping it to fall into position to unlock.

The spring I suspect is looped over the pawl. Considering the penalty of a broken spring (locked closed), I would have designed it with a redundant spring:



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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#18

Post by billdeserthills »

QuangTri wrote: September 14th, 2022, 12:45 pm
smithers599 wrote: September 14th, 2022, 10:19 am So, QuangTri, what's the after-action report? Did the dealer clean, lube, repair, replace?
Liberty replied after suggesting all the "usual" jiggery pokery with +1,2, etc. The tech did mention that it was unlikely a fairly new lock would have slipped a number.

They accepted that it was hosed and are sending a new lock to the safe dealer for install and issued a work order. Would imply they expect the lock to be messed up.

Dunno how long to get a lock from Payson Utah to Tucson. Still waiting for Road Runner safe to contact for the replacement work.

Being able get in and recover stuff took a load off my mind at least. Be climbing the walls if my toys were in there.

Further unlocking tries with the door open do not work, seemed to be a progressive failure. Very intrigued to find out what went wrong. Just had a feeling mech locks worked forever.
'Progressive failure'-- sounds like the worst kind

You'll likely accept the lock Roadrunner installs for you, if you wanted you could get a redundant lock for your safe, that gives you two ways of opening it

https://www.safeandvaultstore.com/produ ... 20Products

This lock is a digital and also has a mechanical dial & it's emp proof too
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#19

Post by QuangTri »

From the email I got from Liberty"

"we will have them put a Prologic lock on your safe, that is an upgrade high end lock."

As long as the damn thing is reliable. I am still stunned that a S & G lock would fail less than a year old.

Hope they let me take a look at it after removal.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#20

Post by billdeserthills »

QuangTri wrote: September 16th, 2022, 6:01 pm From the email I got from Liberty"

"we will have them put a Prologic lock on your safe, that is an upgrade high end lock."

As long as the damn thing is reliable. I am still stunned that a S & G lock would fail less than a year old.

Hope they let me take a look at it after removal.
There won't be anything to see, unless you take the lock apart & even then it sounds like your wheels slipped. Unfortunately S&G has been going downhill lately in the mechanical lock department, which is why they now have Big Red as a competitor
http://www.bigredsafelocks.com/Home-page/

Most folks seem to want a digital lock on their safe but Pro Logic or Securam as I know them by isn't what I would call an 'upgrade'. I'm sure they are considered an upgrade to any safe company over a mechanical lock tho...
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#21

Post by QuangTri »

Tech is supposed to come today, should be interesting. The Big Red failure videos were interesting.
Both S&G locks failed with the second wheel slipping.

Funny, seem to occasionally see really old safes with mech tumblers that still work. Used government safes for years and never knew of a lock failure. Those locks sure seemed a lot more robust that what they put on consumer safes.

Guess you have to be in the specialty to understand how such a mechanism can change for timeless to unreliable.

The lock on my old AmSec safe felt higher quality, and my Sentry combo safe in Hawaii is sloppy but good after twenty years.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#22

Post by QuangTri »

Tech came out and found the lock had slipped one of the wheels. Why?
On a less than one year old safe with probably less than a couple dozen unlockings?

Liberty just sent the same model lock and it was set to the original combo.
Wife is ambivalent about going to an electronic lock, though she is coping with the dialing for now.

Dunno how long it will take me to trust this thing now.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#23

Post by BigNate »

cool arrow wrote: September 13th, 2022, 7:15 am I bought 3 of the exact same safe, when the battery dies in one, I can swap the keypad from one to another and open the safe.

I had one where the keypad went out, and having them be the same allowed me to open the safe while I awaited a replacement keypad.
OK - this worries me... if you can switch keypads between "identical safes" and about 90% of the electronic keypad safes that I see out there have some variant of the "SG" keypad - so does that mean that if one were to go buy a safe with one of those keypads, set the combination, then yank the keypad off of that safe and take it out as a "key" to let themselves in to any other safe with the same keypad - they could? I had always assumed that the keypad passed a numerically / mathematically unique code back to a protected actuator (the code was unique to that safe and that keypad) - and that the keypad only would send that code when the proper pin was provided...

If you can buy "3 identical safes" and swap keypads to get in if one of the batteries dies - that would imply that the unlatch mechanism is actually part of the keypad module - or that a "protected" unlatch mechanism would open when the keypad says "open" (or any common simple signal like power on a wire). Am I reading that wrong? If that is the case I'm a bit freaked out by it.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#24

Post by XJThrottle »

On mine, the connector to the keypad inside the door. You'd be splicing wires to make it work.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#25

Post by cool arrow »

I don't know exactly what your post was trying to get at, but yes, I have swapped keypads when one crapped out.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#26

Post by rockbronco »

BigNate wrote: November 17th, 2022, 3:02 pm
cool arrow wrote: September 13th, 2022, 7:15 am I bought 3 of the exact same safe, when the battery dies in one, I can swap the keypad from one to another and open the safe.

I had one where the keypad went out, and having them be the same allowed me to open the safe while I awaited a replacement keypad.
OK - this worries me... if you can switch keypads between "identical safes" and about 90% of the electronic keypad safes that I see out there have some variant of the "SG" keypad - so does that mean that if one were to go buy a safe with one of those keypads, set the combination, then yank the keypad off of that safe and take it out as a "key" to let themselves in to any other safe with the same keypad - they could? I had always assumed that the keypad passed a numerically / mathematically unique code back to a protected actuator (the code was unique to that safe and that keypad) - and that the keypad only would send that code when the proper pin was provided...

If you can buy "3 identical safes" and swap keypads to get in if one of the batteries dies - that would imply that the unlatch mechanism is actually part of the keypad module - or that a "protected" unlatch mechanism would open when the keypad says "open" (or any common simple signal like power on a wire). Am I reading that wrong? If that is the case I'm a bit freaked out by it.
I swapped a failed keypad on a family members safe(safe was locked at the time) but we still needed the original code to open once plugged in so in that particular case the code has to have been stored in the internal actuator assembly and not the keypad itself.
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Re: mechanical combo lock just decided not to open

#27

Post by BigNate »

rockbronco wrote: November 18th, 2022, 9:17 am
BigNate wrote: November 17th, 2022, 3:02 pm
cool arrow wrote: September 13th, 2022, 7:15 am I bought 3 of the exact same safe, when the battery dies in one, I can swap the keypad from one to another and open the safe.

I had one where the keypad went out, and having them be the same allowed me to open the safe while I awaited a replacement keypad.
OK - this worries me... if you can switch keypads between "identical safes" and about 90% of the electronic keypad safes that I see out there have some variant of the "SG" keypad - so does that mean that if one were to go buy a safe with one of those keypads, set the combination, then yank the keypad off of that safe and take it out as a "key" to let themselves in to any other safe with the same keypad - they could? I had always assumed that the keypad passed a numerically / mathematically unique code back to a protected actuator (the code was unique to that safe and that keypad) - and that the keypad only would send that code when the proper pin was provided...

If you can buy "3 identical safes" and swap keypads to get in if one of the batteries dies - that would imply that the unlatch mechanism is actually part of the keypad module - or that a "protected" unlatch mechanism would open when the keypad says "open" (or any common simple signal like power on a wire). Am I reading that wrong? If that is the case I'm a bit freaked out by it.
I swapped a failed keypad on a family members safe(safe was locked at the time) but we still needed the original code to open once plugged in so in that particular case the code has to have been stored in the internal actuator assembly and not the keypad itself.
OK - this is good to hear... Thanks...
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