Classes of Key Blanks

Whenever we in the trade talk to a commercial customer, we ask what level of keying they want. Often we can make a reasonably good guess knowing the nature of the business and what is locked up. Such conversations often turn into descriptions of different levels of security for key systems. With that, I thought I should explain the classes of key blanks out there.

Open Stock Keys
These are key blanks anybody may buy. Locksmith have them but any retail hardware store can buy them as can property managers. I want to break this group into four smaller sets.

'Common as dirt'
Everybody has these. Everybody. Why not? Everybody had a lock which uses them. Here in western Canada, Weiser has the majority of the household market. I would guess over 90% of homes use this key. You can identify it with the name Weiser on the side, the letters WR5 or WR3 on the side. The other common house keys are KW1 and SC1. (All the cute keys with puppies or symbols or sports teams or a billion other things printed onto them are one of these three keyways.) In my opinion, they are too common since there are mathematically less keys than there are houses in even a small city.

'Readily available'
In this group of keys, the hardware stores still stock them but the wage staff may have to look twice to realize it. The blanks are common but not in the top 3. Examples of these would be the Yale Y1, Schlage SC7, Corbin CO88 and Sargent LA. I would say under 100 blanks make this group.

'Locksmith stock'
Always fun to have a person walk into the shop and ask if we cut keys. Behind us on the wall are a few thousand 'common' blanks. Some are older and some are just rare. I would give names for some but if you are not in the trade, it would be just so many strange codes. Ahhh ... why not. Remember the Sargent LA mentioned about? Well, I was only talking of the 6 pin version as readily available. There are also 5 pin and 7 pin versions. But wait ... that's not all. Sargent had a family of key blank which start with L such as LB, LC, LE, LF, LG, LJ, LK, AND LL. Confused yet? They also make a family which starts with R which has just as many keys. However, to be clear a locksmith would not stock ALL of these but will have the knowledge and reference books to know they exist. Many of those belong in the next category.

'Hen's Tooth'
These are the blanks which are open stock but are so rare they might as well be the teeth of a chicken. You will phone every wholesaler you know trying to find them and are happy when you can get a bag of 10 in 6 weeks. They are never cheap. Your customer may have only wanted 2 but you price them to recover the cost for all the blanks on just those keys because until this same person comes back, you will just be dusting the others. An example in this group are the DOM sectional cabinet locks which are found in European import furniture. We see them with 2 rare keyways and 28 'hen's teeth' keyways.


Restricted Keys
These are key blanks which are only available within the trade and are controlled to various degrees.

'Contractually Restricted'
These blanks are only sold to locksmith shops once they make a commitment to follow some rules. While there are variations in the terms, this usually means you will not sell uncut blanks, you will stamp the cut keys so everybody knows where they came from and you will not duplicate keys from another shop even if you have the blank. (If you are found to be cutting the keys from some other shop, your supply of that blank may be cut off.) This is security by contract and anybody who breaks it risks only civil penalties.
Many of these blanks will have a brand name printed but nothing else. They have keyway part numbers but not that the end user can see. These keys are not high security and the locks they work in are not high security.

'Patent Controlled'
If a key interacts with a lock in some special mechanical way, then a utility patent can be granted and only that company can make and distribute the blanks. These are the high security keys and locks. The downside is that patents run out and then the security starts to decay since others may make the blanks. However, until that time each company can control the blanks and limits them in various ways. Most commonly each locksmith shop will have a keyway but that same keyway may repeat in some other location perhaps a few thousand miles away. They tend to be very wary of saying how many keyways they have in production but seeing some of the other brands it will be well over 100. Additionally, they will not tell you who else uses your keyway or how close they are. If you pay enough money, you can get an exclusive keyway.

These keys are almost always marked 'Do Not Copy' or 'Do Not Duplicate'. While nice, it matters little. Only the shop which has that blank can mechanically copy it. However, the risk is much higher than for the simply contract controlled keys. The maker will pull the right to cut any of those keys and for many shops this will quickly dry up the cash flow for the business. (Locksmiths also live on 'reputation capital' and of you betray trust, it hurts the business fast and bad.)

Does the manufacturer have to supply to the locksmith shops? No. Some keys are factory controlled. You order keys directly from the factory and so the cost is higher and the supply line slower. However, the control is better if you are willing to pay the price. When you become the warden of a prison you will get to order keys using this process. I know not of any other type of place using this class of keys but there may be a few. (A variant of this is when you buy rights to a keyway from the maker and then direct the factory to ship the blanks to a locksmith shop of your choice. You own the blanks but the shop does the cutting.)

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A few last thoughts should be said on automobiles. Everything above can be said about automobiles for those which do NOT have transponders in the blank. Once the transponder is in use, the key is more like an access card for a building. This means all the physical keys for your vehicle are the same but the digital code used by each key is different.


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Laux Myth ... Thoughts From a Locksmith
By MartinB, Found @ http://lauxmyth.blogspot.com/