Schlage Lock Tip

During my many years as a locksmith technician there were many times where I was able to find a solution for a job just by thinking outside the box. There were many times I got stuck doing a job since I didn't have the right part or something went wrong which forced me to improvise in order to complete the job. Through experience I learned to always save parts from various jobs since I knew they may come useful later on. On other times, I found  that unrelated parts that I had saved for a certain job actually came useful for another.

Not too long ago I got a call from one of my customers who wanted me to re-key the lock on his front door. The lock he had was actually a Schlage high security lock that I installed few months before, but he lost once of the keys to it recently and wanted it re-keyed for his peace of mind. Being a returned customer, I accepted the job without any further questions and headed to his address.

Once I got to the customer's home, I started the removal process of the Schlage lock from the door. After the lock was removed, I took with me to the van in order to take it apart and start the re-key process. As I was taking the cylinder off to remove the pins, the cylinder cap retaining spring jumped right off and flew across the van. After few minutes of looking for the spring, I finally gave up and decided to start looking for a replacement. Unfortunately, I did not have any replacement with me, so I had to call another Boise Locksmith technician friend of mine to see if he can bail me out.

When I got my locksmith technician friend on the phone, he said he was to far away from me to come bring me some springs, but he also mentioned something else that I didn't know. Apparently, cylinder springs from a GM pining kit work as a replacement just as well as the original part. Luckily, I did have those with me. After grabbing a spring from the kit, I finished re-keying the cylinder, put the lock back together and re-installed it back on the door.