Abacus
That helpful B4 guy
I have a pile of B4 door handles either I've bought from a junkyard or that people have donated. Some of these I've passed on to other members but the front door handles were always a pain to try and pick. I'd take a small strip of aluminum flashing and cut it down to fit in the lock, then wiggle it up and down fast, then pull it up and see where the brass tumblers hit, and file them down a little. Then rinse and repeat until the lock turned, but it wasn't strong enough to turn by itself.
It was very time consuming but worked.
The issue with the front door handles is the lock has to rotate 180° to come out so the microswitch, shown below, doesn't get destroyed.
This is what happens when you try and remove the lockset without rotating it first. It was on a trashed Chinese door handle so I decided to experiment but nothing worked. I even tried small sims to protect the microswitch but it's not possible the way they're designed.
The microswitch fits into the deep groove and rotating it around allows it to come out.
Recently I decided to tackle another lock picking project and came across these in my travels, so I decided to pick them up. The top one is for the early VW's and the bottom one is for 2000 and newer style, I think up until 2015 at least.
I tried for about 45 minutes on a B4 door handle with no success. I figured it was something I was doing wrong so I decided to make another attempt the following morning. I applied less rotational pressure and the lock yielded in about 30 seconds. I was super impressed.
I am going to pick the ones I have and get them ready in case they're needed. I'm also looking into how to disassemble the door handles to replace just the microswitch in case the rest of the door handle is toast. The Chinese ones are not the same as the OEM handles but they are close enough that I can use some of the parts, but not all. I can also re-key locks with spares I've taken apart over the years but I cannot cut new keys. I also need to replace the switch in my ultrasonic parts cleaner so I can clean them properly.
I am not looking to get into doing this as a service as I have a day job, this is just for fun and because I'm "That helpful B4 guy".
It was very time consuming but worked.
The issue with the front door handles is the lock has to rotate 180° to come out so the microswitch, shown below, doesn't get destroyed.
This is what happens when you try and remove the lockset without rotating it first. It was on a trashed Chinese door handle so I decided to experiment but nothing worked. I even tried small sims to protect the microswitch but it's not possible the way they're designed.
The microswitch fits into the deep groove and rotating it around allows it to come out.
Recently I decided to tackle another lock picking project and came across these in my travels, so I decided to pick them up. The top one is for the early VW's and the bottom one is for 2000 and newer style, I think up until 2015 at least.
I tried for about 45 minutes on a B4 door handle with no success. I figured it was something I was doing wrong so I decided to make another attempt the following morning. I applied less rotational pressure and the lock yielded in about 30 seconds. I was super impressed.
I am going to pick the ones I have and get them ready in case they're needed. I'm also looking into how to disassemble the door handles to replace just the microswitch in case the rest of the door handle is toast. The Chinese ones are not the same as the OEM handles but they are close enough that I can use some of the parts, but not all. I can also re-key locks with spares I've taken apart over the years but I cannot cut new keys. I also need to replace the switch in my ultrasonic parts cleaner so I can clean them properly.
I am not looking to get into doing this as a service as I have a day job, this is just for fun and because I'm "That helpful B4 guy".
