Fire door guards

In addition to my regular locksmithing work, I have now added the installation of fire door guards to my abilities.

These door guards hold fire doors open for as long as is convenient in busy offices, schools, care homes, or other spaces where those doors must be closed in the event of a fire. Once the guard hears an alarm, it releases, shutting the door when it absolutely needs to close to stop the spread of fire.

The Fireco Dorgards allow busy office workers unrestricted movement through buildings without having to stop every few metres and juggle heavy loads while trying to open doors that are already resistant because they must have automatic closers installed. They allow school corridors to be kept open allowing teachers and pupils to get to their classes quickly. In care homes, they allow residents to move through the corridors without having to battle heavy doors they might not be able to push or pull unaided.

Many big public buildings have fire doors held open with wedges or fire extinguishers that obviously will not allow the doors to close in the unfortunate event of a fire. This can lead to cases of criminal negligence.

If you work in an office, school, care home or any space where fire doors hinder daily routines, why not get in contact and ask me for a free survey and quotation.

You can contact me via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading

admin April 22, 2019

Fire doors / Fire safety / Fireco Dorgurad /

Landlords and Copied Keys

Just a very brief blog here for landlords, particularly of holiday lets, and about copying keys.

You may get two or three keys with your new lock. If you have any more cut (one for the letting agency, one for the cleaner, etc), then please ensure you personally keep an original and the tenants use an original. Far too often I am seeing locks break because poor cut copies wear the inner levers/pins and suddenly, you are left with new customers having to use back doors because they cannot get in or out via the front.

Customers who jiggle the keys to unlock the door will forget to mention it to the letting agents. Cleaners who know the ‘Knack’ won’t even think about it. Test your doors on a regular basis. If the locks are not running as smooth with the door closed as they do with the door open, then get them looked at before a customer complains and demands money back. And when you are ordering new locks, order extra keys at the same time, insisting on genuinely branded keys. It might cost a little more, but will give you peace of mind, because the extra keys bought with the lock will be covered by the guarantee. Using keys cut elsewhere will invalidate the guarantee.

If you have any questions regarding the above, please get in touch via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading.

admin March 29, 2019

Copied keys problems / Holiday let lock issues /

What Simple Security Steps will make your home much Safer?

Simple security steps to help make your home safer 

Every other week, I help my kids out with the delivery of the local community magazine. We do just over two hundred houses in a small town. Every time I do these deliveries, I am shocked to see people’s front doors with keys in which I could have taken, using their own cars as getaway vehicles (‘It was only for five minutes,’ they tell me), or doors ajar, just waiting for someone to poke their head inside with no one around. In these latter cases, you can’t use the letterbox as the door swings, but you can open the door a bit more, unchallenged, which reveals all sorts of easily stolen items. I also see letters piled up, indicating no one has been home for a few days at least (easy prey). Just today, I noticed the magazine I posted two weeks ago, which told me a lot.

I do also see good things, and it is those I would like to talk about because they offer security you wouldn’t think about. An awful lot of the non-destructive entries I do are through the letterbox. And if I can do that, the burglar can. So if you have locks that look like this on the inside:

Thumb turn Thumb turn

Night latch Night latchI can get to these through the letterbox and open the door in seconds. Even kitemarked products are not impossible to open. Leaving keys on the inside of the lock is just as bad. You can get letterbox guards that stop me using my specialist tool, but even these can be bypassed. But here is something that is going to cause me problems.

Letter box cage

A letter cage stops all tools being able to get more than a few inches through the letterbox.

Better still, bolt your letterbox shut and get one of these external letterboxes;

Not only will this mean no one gets in through your letter plate, but a separate letterbox at the end of your garden will have you loved by the postman and paper deliverers everywhere.

If you have any questions regarding the above information, please get in touch via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading.

admin March 17, 2019

Improving your home security / letterbox security / make my home safer /

Blow torch attacks and door maintenance

It seems there is a new spate of attacks in the UK where the burglars use a blow torch on plastic (upvc) double glazed doors. Because they are using fire, this makes a major mess of the door and frame. You are not just looking at replacement locks, but a whole replacement door. If you have the anti-snap cylinders available in DIY stores, then you are still going to be a victim with this sort of attack. If you have an inner anti-snap protector, as used on many new build properties, the burglar will still have a go before he sees the protector. You might not be burgled, but your door is ruined.
Kite marked lock

To be properly protected, you need the advice of a good local locksmith who has access to the very best locks and equipment. They will provide you with the locks that show the burglar they are wasting their time attacking your property. The potential intruder needs to see from a distance that easier pickings are to be had elsewhere.

Thinking anyone can get in if they really want to is unfortunately usually correct, but burglars want to get in as quickly and quietly as possible. The other worry with this blow torch method is heat transference; the intruder can see the damage they are doing to the outside, but they cannot see if they are causing flames inside. It is a very dangerous form of attack especially as nearly half of all burglaries occur when someone is home.
Moving on from that last point, recent reports show that adults and children suffer long term effects of insecurity following burglaries.
Finally, while I was halfway through writing this piece about blow torch attacks, I had a recall from a customer whose lock had failed. Once I got the lock open, I discovered the door was sticking a lot at the bottom. Where the door was not closing properly, the latch was being placed under long term pressure, which led to the lock breaking internally. Doors warp, drop, swell and buckle. Kids will try and slam them with the bolt extended and all sorts of other damage can occur. As a general rule of thumb, if the door is even marginally difficult to lock/unlock, then something, somewhere, is going to be out of alignment. If your door needs a boot at the bottom to get it closed, do something about it before the cost becomes prohibitive. If the door is ok, but the lock is still difficult, a good locksmith will lock at the problem without charge. It’s then up to you whether or not you enter into a situation where the locksmith corrects the problem for a fee. If your lock is stiff and you don’t sort out the problem now, chances are it will fail when you get home from the school run with three screaming kids and their buddies on a sleepover and all of them will be wanting the toilet. On top of that, all the local locksmiths will be busy for the next seven hours or not even picking up the phone, meaning you have to call a national, who will charge you double, and you will wish you had gotten around to dealing with the problem when time was on your side. This same advice applies to locks where you need a special knack to unlock it. That knack might have been good for five years, or five minutes, but sooner or later, a lock that does not function normally, will fail and it will be at an inopportune moment.
Thanks for reading.
If you have any questions regarding the above, please get in touch via the contacts page.

admin February 28, 2019

Home maintenance for locks / Keeping safe / Minimising risk of burglary in your home /

Why should I change the locks on my brand new property?

There seems to be a massive drive to build new homes lately. Almost everywhere you go, you are bound to be driving past a new build construction site. You might even be looking at a nice newly built home in your area. The beauty of a new home over an older one is that you can move in knowing you have nothing to do. The carpets are already fitted to your criteria, the sparkly kitchen gleams and there is no worry that some random neighbour has a spare key to your home.Home security

So why change the locks? Quite frankly, the developers will do the minimum possible to meet regulations, and currently, in the UK the regulations just are not up to the same level as the burglars. New homes are all being built with multipoint locking mechanisms and while all the hooks, bolts and rollers look impressive and secure, the system is only as good as its’ weakest part, which is the locking cylinder. While standard locking Euro Cylinders are acceptable for insurance purposes, they are incredibly weak to a form of attack called “cylinder snapping.” Property developers will use these standard cylinders wherever possible.

Some of the more reputable developers will at least have the decency to install kite marked Euro cylinders in their doors, but beyond the kite mark, there are still three grades of security, which cover the three main forms of attack, those being snap, pick and drilling. So a cylinder with one star will be proof against picking but not the other two, and a cylinder with two stars will still be susceptible to attack by one of the three main methods. You can supplement the star rating by having anti-snap collars placed inside the handles, or anti-drill handles. You may even have these, but if you don’t know, then the burglar doesn’t know either and he is likely to have a go, fail and leave your door a mess before he leaves. Only a three-star cylinder should be used if you want the burglar to go away before even trying.

With total honesty, there is a tool that can be purchased to bypass even some of the best three-star cylinders, but it takes time to use and is fiddly. Entry with this tool is trial and error, sometimes taking many minutes to get in the door, whereas a standard cylinder can be snapped in under 60 seconds with household tools and no sound. For the same reason, a burglar will not take the time to remove your roof tiles and enter that way, he will not purchase a tool that takes him many times longer to get in than the cheap tools he can get from a DIY store.

Cylinder snapping is no longer about normal burglary any more. Intruders know that most people leave their car keys somewhere in the vicinity of the front door, be they left on a surface, hanging on a convenient hook, or just in a coat pocket. They can now look for the car they want to steal parked nicely on your front drive. As most of us are now two-car families, at least one will sit on the drive, and if that car is your brand new Mercedes or BMW and you keep your keys close to an easily attacked door, your insurance might decide not to pay out because you didn’t take enough care. How many people tell their insurance the car is kept in the garage, knowing that actually, the garage is full of the toot we don’t want in our actual houses? Breaking into a house and stealing the keys is now the easiest way to steal their car.

And while a barking dog is a deterrent to some degree, what protects your home when you are on holiday or even out walking that dog?

Most three-star Euro cylinders are visibly different to standard cylinders. They shout at the burglar you are serious about home security and that attacking your home is going to be noisy and time-consuming. Noise and time are the enemy of the burglar. If he knows breaking into your home is going to be noisy and take up precious time, he is going to move on. If you fit the proper cylinders, chances are you will be angry with the locksmith after years and years of never seeing any signs of attack. You will never know how many intruders scouted your home and mentally noted to leave you alone. It’s not hard. I help my kids with their paper round, and the best locks stick out like a sore thumb. I know exactly how few there are and where they are. A potential intruder only has to deliver some bogus leaflets in any area to work out who is best avoided.

While on this subject, I was emailed a question asking if it is worth putting extra strength glue in an externally beaded window so that if the burglar got the beading off the window would still be stuck in place. Beading removal was never a hugely popular method of attack. There was always too much potential to make noise and take a long time. Also, the risk of breaking glass and then cutting oneself is too high, even without extra glues. Cylinder snapping is quick, quiet and easy. So faced with a choice, you should always upgrade your cylinders.

If you have standard cylinders or even kite marked one-star cylinders, you should upgrade now. If you don’t know what you have, a good locksmith in your area will come and assess your locks via a free security check. Unless a locksmith has provided your locks, I very much doubt they will be the best on the market. You cannot buy the best locks in the DIY shops. While you are ensuring you have the best locks, you should be sending a copy of this information to everyone you care about, because of the following reasons:

* Burglary is on the rise.

* Traditionally ‘safe’ areas are being burgled more often.

* Only a tiny fraction of burglaries get investigated by police.

* You are now at risk from car thieves as well.

* Burglars pass on information to each other, so if you are burgled once, you stand an increased chance of being hit again.

* Every victim I speak to, reports a feeling of personal violation, sleepless nights and detachment from their home.

If you have any questions regarding the above information or any of the other blogs I have written, please get in touch via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading.

admin February 9, 2019

Minimising risk of burglary / New build homes & security / Why change my locks? /

Auto Locksmiths in Norfolk

At the time of writing, it’s been 18 months since I added vehicles to my locksmithing abilities, and despite a very intense, thorough training course, I have learned some lessons along the way that might help you when deciding what to do about your lost car key.

AC locksmiths AutoAs a general rule of thumb, if your vehicle is registered before the early 2000’s, then there is a good chance the mobile auto locksmith will not be able to provide you with a new key, and if he can, the cost will be in the same price range as the car value anyway, so you might be better off purchasing another vehicle.

If you own a Freelander and only have one key, get another one right now. You will have to search for this and will probably have to go back to manufacturer which can take a long time so if you don’t want to be without the use of your vehicle, get a spare made sooner rather than later. I went on a website that claimed to do Freelander keys by post, but when you actually talk to them in person, you find they can’t do it.

Never buy a 2nd hand Volvo with only one key. You will have to go back to manufacturer to get a spare and they are not cheap. Let me amend that. Never buy any 2nd hand car with only one key. Sometimes, a new key can mean the locksmith has to strip the entire dash out, locate a small chip on a circuit board and place that chip on a special circuit board in order to code in the new key. On the side of the road, in poor winter light, in the back of a van being buffeted by wind, the locksmith has to perform the most delicate of soldering jobs where one mistake can kill your car.

If you go on holiday, take the spare car key with you and leave it at the hotel/caravan/tent, etc when you go out. You will be thankful you did when you lock your keys in your car boot and know that a cab will be much cheaper than getting a locksmith because you left your keys at home 300 miles away.

And finally, car keys need not be boring! In the same way you get exciting phone cases, you can have coloured key fobs, leather fob cases, shiny chrome edges, or faux styles that put your car key blade in the style of a more exclusive vehicle range. If you are stuck for present ideas for someone, why not bling their car key? A present with a difference that need not break the bank. This idea goes down well with young men and their cars. You have no idea what to buy you’re your newly adult kids. Car key bling is great, and as they will probably change their car often, you can always do the same again next year, which means less time trying to figure out what they want.

If you have any questions regarding the above information, please do not hesitate to get in touch via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading.

Auto locksmith Holt

Auto locksmith Sheringham

Auto locksmith Cromer

Auto locksmith Fakenham

Auto Locksmith Briston

Auto locksmith Melton Constable

Auto locksmith North Walsham

Auto locksmith Mundesley

Car locksmith Holt

Car locksmith Sheringham

Car locksmith Cromer

Car locksmith Fakenham

Car Locksmith Briston

Car locksmith Melton Constable

Car locksmith North Walsham

Car locksmith Mundesley

admin December 24, 2018

auto locksmith Norfolk / Car locksmith /

Home security – The best Christmas present ever

What are you getting your parents for Christmas this year? Hankies? Pants and socks? A poinsetta plant? A box of chocolates?

Difficult, isn’t it. Maybe they already have everything they could want within an acceptable price range. Maybe you just get them the same things every year out of habit. Maybe they are just don’t make use of the practical presents you would like to get for them.

So why not think outside the box? How long ago did they change their locks? Do their locks even meet today’s insurance standards? How many keys have been lost over the years? How much safer will they feel when they have a nice, new lock fitted?

Better yet, why not get them a doorbell that links to a phone with a screen meaning they can see and talk to someone at the door without ever having to get up or open the door to a stranger.

Or, even better, how about a home security alarm system with added features like a panic button that can alert you if they take a fall, or will allow you to use your mobile phone to check in on them from time to time.

AC Locksmiths

This Christmas, or birthday or just because you can, why not get your parents something that matters? Part of the joy of Christmas is seeing the people you love use the present you buy them. Pants and socks just don’t quite work.

If you have any questions regarding the above information, please get in touch via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading, and Merry Christmas

admin December 19, 2018

Alternative Christmas present ideas / Christmas present /

Rental & holiday home locks

Just recently, I was called to a holiday let property at midnight because the lock had failed and the holiday makers were unable to get in. By the time I got there, the property owner had also arrived and there was an atmosphere you could have cut with a knife. It was cold, dark and wet. The holiday makers wanted to get in from a night out, the owner had been in bed and both were insinuating it was the others’ fault that the key was not working. Luckily, I was able to jiggle the key and get them all into the house quickly. But the lock was old and both keys were having problems, so I showed the landlord as discreetly as possible it was her problem and got that lock changed as fast as possible in order to get away from the tension that was growing with every minute.

A C Locksmiths Norfolk

The landlord had made several mistakes:

Firstly, she had let a lock get too old. The industry recommends that you change your locks every five years as standard. Of course, in the home, we hardly even think of changing our locks until they go wrong, but as another recent customer told me, she got her locks changed because her teenage son kept hiding keys in the garden so his friends could let themselves in when they wanted! He then forgot where he would hide them and she thought he might have lost around seven keys and even had more cut that she didn’t know about. With a holiday let home, you should be more vigilant with locks. Especially near the coast where they get weather beaten and corrode more quickly. Also, we trust our houses to strangers. How do we know none of them are making copies to return in a year or two to break in when other holiday makers are out? For security and peace of mind, it is good practice to get into the habit of changing the locks on a holiday let yearly. If you do it in late March, you won’t even notice the cost because it’s tax deductible. You have nothing to lose.

The second mistake was giving customers copy keys: locks come with two or three keys as standard. Always keep one key to have for emergency copy purposes. The others should be for the use of customers. They will be the ones using the lock the most. If you damage a lock using inferior cut keys, you have no come back on guarantees. If you have cleaners and/or management companies looking after your property, they should be using the copies because they only usually need to go in once a week on change over day. But the keys that are used the most should always be the originals. As a side note, in my experience, the worst key copiers are chain stores. Support your local cobbler/engraver as they usually do a much better job. But most of the time, even the local key cutters will only stock non-original brand key blanks. Customers don’t want to pay for the branded keys. But branded keys last longer and work better with the locks. If you have a Yale lock, you want a key that also has Yale written on it, not JMA or worse still, no marks at all. The absolute best thing you can do is to order all the keys you need when you talk to your locksmith about fitting a new lock. Remember, it’s a business expense, so you might as well get something for your money rather than lose it to the tax man.

Holiday let owners know the peace of mind that comes with having customers who come back year after year or recommend their property to others. It’s a lot better than having to refund a customer because of something that could easily have been avoided. And unfortunately, you can’t rely on the cleaners/management company to notice. The cleaners quickly get used to locks that need a knack (they need changing quickly) and the management companies don’t want to keep hassling you for jobs that require expenses, especially if they have to pay the trader and then wait for you to pay them. A good holiday let owner will have a locksmith go in and look at all their doors and windows, either at the start or end of the season. UPVC doors might need adjusting, wooden doors might have swollen or as was the case with some doors this dry summer, contracted to a point of the locks being unusable. Mechanisms should be oiled twice a year (when clocks go forward and back is a good habit to get into) and handles might have lost their spring. A door and lock might seem like a boring thing, but it is your customer’s first point of contact with your house. They won’t notice if it all runs smoothly, but if it looks shabby or is a bit stiff, that sets the tone for more things to find wrong, whether they know it or not.

For property owners of longer lease homes, you really should be changing the locks between tenants. No matter how good your outgoing tenant s may have been, you simply don’t know how many copies of keys they have had made. Scarily I’ve seen it a number of times when people buy homes for themselves, and later discover the old owner letting themselves in. Again, as this is a business expense, there is nothing to stop you installing new locks. And better you do it rather than the tenant. At least you can use the same locksmith every time who will usually use the same brands so your door is not being weakened by different sized locks needing ever bigger holes in the door.

As a tenant, you are well within your rights to demand that your new landlord provide new locks with original cut keys. Any additional keys should be discussed with the landlord because if you get bad cut copies, the lock becomes your problem.

If you have any questions regarding the above information, please don’t hesitate to get in touch using any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading

admin November 23, 2018

Changing the locks / Holiday homes / Rental homes /

Dark Nights

Now the clocks have changed, bringing the dark evenings with them, we have to prepare for the sadly inevitable increase in burglaries.

Make your property more secure

Time and again I hear the phrase: You will never stop the determined invader getting into your home. This is true, but your aim is to make life so difficult for him, he goes on to an easier target. If he gets in through a window, make sure he has to leave through that same window while he is carrying his ill-gotten gains and hopefully he will cut himself on broken glass leaving DNA evidence. The police are hard stretched to even investigate most burglaries, so any evidence you can provide will be a good thing, and while it might not get your possessions back, a very nasty person might just be prevented from stealing someone else’s  irreplaceable family heirloom.

Smart technology is making life easier, but too many people think it is out of their price range. That is simply no longer true. DIY kits can be bought on line with cameras small enough to not be seen. If your parents or anyone you care about are technology illiterate, why not set them up a system that sends images to your mobile phone? Not only can you keep them safe from invaders, but also keep a check on them if they fall. Obviously professional installations are better, but no one needs to be unprotected. Doorbell cameras synched to your mobile phone allow you to not only see who is at your door, but talk to them too, even if you are on the other side of the world. This technology allows you to vet whoever comes to your door without you needing to get up from your chair, a great defence against door step scams and distractors.

Bright sensor lights always make burglars jumpy, so make sure there are no dark spots around your perimeter. Good ones can distinguish between humans and smaller animals so they are not going off like discos. Window locks are required by insurance companies on ground floor windows and usually first floor windows as well. But make sure these are visible to someone scouting. In all honesty, most window locks are fairly easy to bypass, but cable restrictors add a second line of defence and are especially good upstairs in summer for rooms you want aired, but without danger of children managing to open the window enough to fall out.

Your door locks should always carry a British Standard Kite Mark. It is required by your insurance company if you have a wooden door, but anyone who has seen me bypass a door with multi-point locking mechanism in seconds will always upgrade to a kite marked cylinder without hesitation. Again, you can buy these in DIY stores, but it takes a professional to know which kite marked ones are best. Even some of the kite marked ones can now be bypassed with a cheapish tool, so contact your local locksmith before buying any old lock, even if you trust the brand name. Also beware of smart locks. In some cases, making life easier by switching to a keyless lock is also making life easier for the burglar. By ditching the key, you may well also be ditching security. Smart locks are a new thing and a good locksmith will be able to show you the good from the bad. I personally have several orders on hold because I awaiting the launch of a smart lock that will be perfect for wooden doors.

With the run up to Christmas, don’t forget to keep yourself safe in the crowds as well. Put your wallet in different pocket to usual so you will feel it more if someone tries to pick pocket you. Put cards and cash in separate places about your person so if one gets stolen, you still have the other for emergency use. Keep bags zipped up and a tight hold on straps. Wear straps across body as this makes them harder to cut for the bag thief.

If parking in a roofed car park, park with your boot facing outwards. That way, anyone trying to open it will be easier to spot by cameras and passers by. When you open your boot, take the extra seconds to pocket your keys rather than putting them down in the boot. No one wants to add the cost of an auto locksmith having to come and open the car that has been locked with all keys still in the boot. Yes, it does happen a lot.

If you have any questions regarding the above or any information in any of my blogs, please do not hesitate to contact me via me via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading!        

admin November 15, 2018

Smart technology / Winter home security /

Digital Doorbells and Viewers

As we approach an ever more digital age, it seems the amount of computerised items we never we needed is getting ever bigger. I think then advantages of a digital door viewer are well worth the cost to anyone. But so few of us even know they exist.

ERA doorbell tech
So what are they? Door viewers have been around for a long time. They allow you to get a good look at who is outside, ringing your doorbell (unless you are in a horror movie when they never seem to work!). But the vision through one has always been a bit warped and if you are visually impaired, they are pretty useless. Digital door viewers are different. You can either have a camera placed centrally in the door, or attached to your doorbell with either a screen on the inside of the door that is large enough for you to see the person outside, or a message can be sent to your mobile phone so you can see who is coming to your house, even while you are sipping cocktails in your holiday bar. Some systems will either let you talk to the visitor from your phone, or from a special phone in the house, meaning the elderly and/or infirm don’t have to get out of their seats to deal with nuisance callers, or worse still con artists.

These digital viewers can be used as a stand alone product, or as part of an integrated security system. They can be set to take a picture of the person calling along with date and time stamp, or some will even record a continuous video loop so that you can monitor any suspicious activity going on outside your home. As an example, I was recently at a property where a suspected drugs deal was happening next door. Those who were allegedly purchasing the drugs parked right in front of a digital door viewer and the car number plate was easily observable, as was the driver exiting the car and returning with a bag he did not have before. All this recorded and kept in case of future need. As a stand alone product, digital door viewers are now affordable to most, and will act as a good deterrent to anyone seeking to invade your home, or the home of those you love.

I know it’s only just the end of summer, but as an idea, instead of buying your parents the usual this Christmas, why not buy them something that will boost their home security, save them having to get up every time a salesman knocks, and allow them to nose about at what’s going on outside?

While there are loads of designs and manufacturers to choose from, I personally recommend ERA products as they can be expanded for use with the ERA home guard system, which is almost completely wireless, remotely accessible and will be crowned by an insurance rated brilliant smart lock in the very near future.

If you have any queries regarding the above information, please do not hesitate to get in contact with me via any of the methods on my contacts page.

Thanks for reading

admin August 31, 2018

Digital door viewer / Door cam / Lock tech /

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