Securing Your Home

There are many ways that home intruders use to break into a home. Although most of them will use sophisticated methods in order to break into a home, there are many ways and step you can take a s a home owner that will help prevent any intrusion to your residential property.

-It is often negligent for people to not take the security of their home seriously and will have cheap lock installed to save some money. If you care about the security of your home, we would recommend to install high quality grade 1 locks on all exterior doors of your residential property the least. Otherwise, it would not take much for a thief to unlock a door equipped with a cheap lock using a Safeway card.

-To enhance the security of the doors surrounding your home, we recommend adding multiple locks for each door. Having number of locks installed on your front door for example will significantly slow any burglar from a successful attempt entering your home. A deadbolt would be a good addition.

-Next step is taking care all windows surrounding the first floor of your home the least by adding special window locks. If you like leaving your windows open at night or when you are gone for fresh air, there are special locks that will lock the moving window i place which will allow you to leave it slightly open and lock it in place.

-A garage door door is also a coveted point of entry for intruders. If you are gone fora long vacation, we recommend adding a garage door lock to secure the garage door in place where it could not be opened automatically.

-In addition to locks in order to secure your home, it is recommended adding some more elements that will make an intruder to think twice before attempting to break into your home at night. Elements such as exterior lighting around your home with the addition of motion sensors. An alarm can also be a nice addition as most alarm system today will automatically notify the police in case of a break-in attempt.

For more information about ways to protect your home, contact NorthWest Locksmith Boise.

Residential Key-less Entry Lock

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Key-less Entry Locks Benefits

The most popular advance lock technology for residential homes in recent days is key-less entry systems. One of the reasons it is very popular mainly due to the fact that it eliminates some of the method used by intruders in order to crack traditional type locks such as picking and bumping. With key-less entry technology, specifically digital locks, there are other things that affect the mechanism in order to unlock a lock.

A good popular example is a push-button key-less entry lock. These types of locks work on a unique code principle which is programmed and can be reprogrammed into the lock using a combination of 4 to 6 digits. This combination of unique code will initially allow unlocking the mechanism and gain entry. One of the advantages of the system is the fact that it is offered in various designs and mechanism types such as a deadbolt or a Mortise lock for example. Another advantage is the fact that most push button locks in the market will allow multiple user access in which each user will have a unique code to use in order to gain access.

Another popular key-less entry option is a bio-metric fingerprint lock. These types of locks will work on a fingerprint principle in order to unlock the locking mechanism of the lock. Once the user fingerprint has been scanned by the lock, it will convert the print to a unique code associated with it and unlock the lock. Similar to a push-button lock, this type of lock accept multiple users in its system as well.

So what is the benefit of having these types of key-less entry locks you ask? The first one would be the elimination of managing your keys. It is very common for people to lose and keep track on their keys which leads to stress and calls to a professional locksmith most of the times. With a key-less entry lock, this will not be the case. The home owner will only have to remember the unique combination he chose versus keeping track on his keys. With a bio-metric lock, it makes the home owner lives even easier where no code need to be remembered.

To learn more about our key-less entry lock options, give us a call or visit NorthWest Locksmith Boise.

Exit Devices Commercial Services

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Lock Change or Re-key?

There could be many reasons when a home or business owner decides to get new locks for his property. Examples such as employees leaving, tenants moving out, suspicious of a stranger that might got a hold of a key, and others. No matter what the reason could be, there are couple of option that can be done in these cases which are either changing the locks or re-key them. both options had their advantages and disadvantages that should be taken in consideration before deciding on the type of service with a professional locksmith.

Going back at least a hundred years, a re-key service came to life when a locksmith came up with the idea of a lock that was built using pins that can be changed inside the lock. Changing the pins inside the lock caused the original key that came with the lock to be useless. Nowadays, most locks in the market can be re-keyed without any issues with the exception of several specialty high security locks built with a mechanism that will not allow such change or tampering.

Normally, re-keying a lock is a much cheaper alternative for having a new lock installed as in addition to the labor, the cost of locks will add significantly to the cost of the job. Most locksmith technicians will be able to come to location and re-pin the lock for you without any issues while others give you the option to bring the lock to their shop and have the service done there. Before re-pinning the lock, a new key will be made to match the new combination inside the lock. Not only its much cheaper, but also takes much less time than changing the locks. These types of advantages become significant when multiple locks would need to be address such as a big house, or an apartment complex property.

The only significant disadvantage in having a lock re-keyed would be if the lock is suspected to be damaged. Re-keying the lock, normally won't repair any damage or wear that the lock had suffer during time. However, most locksmith technicians do offer lock repair services. Depending on the damage, in these cases, it might be cheaper to just change the locks.

Changing locks on the other hand should be considered if your home or business equipped with standard cheap locks and you are looking to add some security. In such case, re-keying the locks will be useless and getting a high security lock would be recommended. Installing new locks also bring you the peace of mind insuring you the lock will be free of defects and malfunctions. In addition, locks from the leading brands in the industry normally come with a warranty as well.

Aside from the price involving changing the locks, one of the disadvantages can be a compatibility with a specific type of door that is being used in your home or business. In these types of situations, some parts would need to be added or modification to the door would be in place in order to accommodate the new locks and especially if they are high security. These elements might get the price of installing a new lock even higher than expected in the first place.

Automotive Re-key Services

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Panic Device Lockout

There is a reason why commercial grade locks are normally considered to be more security than standard or residential type locks. Commercial grade locks are high security locks that usually are much harder to break into than the traditional residential lock. Most locksmith technician are trained and have the experience unlocking these types of commercial grade locks in case of a lockout situation. However, those who don't, usually will come up with a different creative way to unlock the lock. Sometimes, locksmith technicians will drill the lock which will not make the customer happy since he will most likely need to invest in a new lock.

I remember a while back I got a call from an employee of one of the local stores in the area that have been locked out. Apparently, the employee went out of the store through the emergency exit door out the back in order to throw the garbage outside and got locked out. I knew that I would probably have to deal with an exit device mechanism which is not easy, but since I had good experience with these types lock system, I decided to take the job.

Once I got to the store, I wanted to check the lock and see what I was dealing with in order to figure out the best way to unlock it. I then decided to try and pick the lock since that seemed to be my only option. However, no matter how I tried picking the lock, I just couldn't unlock it. Since picking didn't work, my only option seem to be drilling. Before going with the option of damaging the lock, I decided to get a Boise locksmith co worker of mine to the store to see if he could pick it open or at least think of something else.

When my co worker finally arrived, he tried picking the lock without success as well. He then noticed there was a fairly large gap between the doors which gave him the idea of using an automotive lockout tool key. Using the gap between the doors, he was able to slide the across-the-window automotive tool that had a loop at the end and pull on the panic device bar in order to open the door. The employee was relived that we didn't have to damage the lock, but we did told him to inform the manager he should take care of the gap between the doors as it was a security hazard.