A Complete Guide on How to Pick a Lock with a Knife

how to pick a lock with a knife

Table of Contents

Occasionally, you may encounter a situation where you are unable to access your home or a specific area within it. Luckily, a basic knife, such as a simple butter knife, can usually be used to unlock a typical door. There are various scenarios that can lead to this happening. However, it is important to refrain from entering someone else’s property, especially if it is a residential building or room.

What You’ll Need

A knife blade / Butter knife / Fixed-blade knife

(Any kind of sharp knife: especially kitchen knives, which is not a bulky knife).

The Basic Steps of How to Pick a Lock with a Knife

Step 1:  Preparing for the Lock Pick

different type of lock

Pick a lock and get acquainted with the way it works before using it. After all, there are different types of locks of a wide variety, and you would need to know what you are dealing with.

If the door secures with a bolt and there is a lock on the doorknob, it will be impossible to open with a knife. You should be able to open the lock if it is spring-loaded or has a button lock on it.

The door secures by a latch that pops out of a pocket built into the jamb to serve as a latch when the door is closed. You should be able to unlock the door by turning the knob or lever on the side of the door. If it is locked, this rule does not apply to that situation.

To open a door of this sort, you should be able to retract the latch by using a butter knife or knife blade to manipulate the mechanism that controls it.

Although the push-button lock is the one that you can open with the least amount of effort, it is not the most secure option. You will need to fiddle with the internal mechanics of the lock to extract the button from a lock such as this one.

Step 2:  Choosing the Correct Tool

small knife

Find a knife and use it to open the door. This should be something that could substitute for an actual lock pick. When trying to unlock a door, avoid using a knife if it is super sharp or pointy.

According to Wikihow, you need to be extra careful when handling sharp objects. So consider using something simple, like a butter knife or an ambidextrous knife, as a starting point. This is because if you make a mistake, you may cut yourself with the knife. Remember, make sure you are careful with the knife handle.

If the keyhole is particularly small, you might need a tiny knife with a sharp edge to get through it. If the lock is small, like the one on a bicycle, a pocket knife might open it. Assisted-opening knives would also be a proper choice when practicing how to pick a lock with a knife.

A paper clip or hair clip is better if the outer handle hole is a circle instead of a slit. If the external handle of the knife has a slit, then it ought to function.

Step 3.1:  Onto the Actual Lock Picking

You do not need to have to choose from the latest cutting-edge lock pins to learn how to pick a lock with a knife. We can go with the traditional lock picking methods or resort to alternative methods if the prior fails.

After having identified the lock mechanism, slide the knife’s blade through the hole in the door frame. Again, a little knife blade could come in handy for this purpose.

In practice, you will be applying minimal pressure, along with torque to the blade with the knife, or you will jiggle it like a key.

Put the blade inside the lock, which is as far as it will go. Position it so that it fits into the lower part of the keyhole. Apply pressure in one direction at first, then switch to the opposing direction and repeat.

You will, in essence, need to wiggle the knife to get it through the keyhole.

There is a possibility of a click. If that is the case, the lock ought to have some give to it.

That means you have made it inside. Opening the door might be a time-consuming process.

Step 3.2:  Follow up

As the starting position, ready the knife of choice so that it fits in the space between the door and the striker plate placed on the door jamb. Continue to move it in a slight rotation until you feel the blade bottoming out on the locking mechanism.

The vast majority of people are aware of how something like this operates. You need to find the spot on the door where the lock is.

Make the lock easier to unlock by moving it inwards with a sweeping motion using the end of the knife as a pry bar. When you are ready, insert the butter knife between the door frame and the door. Do this around three inches above the door knob.

Find the door bolt by sliding the knife along the door until you locate the bolt. Continue to work the knife into the wood until you can remove the bolt from the doorframe.

Alternative Ways to Use Blades in Picking Locks

Lock picking requires manipulating the minute internal components of a lock. You have to do this through a keyhole that is only a few millimeters wide. It is labor that requires precision and finesse, which are characteristics that a knife cannot provide.

It is sometimes quite difficult to pick certain locks with a knife because the most accurate part of them is the very tip. This makes it impossible for knives to perform the exact lifting motion that is necessary. That is if they are even capable of passing through the keyhole.

This does not imply that blades are completely ineffective when it comes to picking locks. We can use a blade to unlock a locked door in many unconventional ways. There are a lot of ways we can achieve this.

1. Paper Clips

In combination with the knife, use an opened paper clip or hair clip. Place it onto the knife blade while retaining the knife blade’s location in the keyhole.

Rotate the knife’s blade while exerting a twisting pressure on the lock. Before attempting to put a paper clip through the door, flatten the end of the paper clip with a hammer.

Move the pick back and forth over the keyhole pins. You do not want to harm the lock or the knife. Try wiggling the knife with care until you hear a click.

Insert the end of the tension wrench into the bottom of the lock aperture, then swivel the lock to the side to unlock the door. Continue applying pressure while maintaining the tension wrench’s position.

After flattening the paperclip, lay it over the tension wrench and apply pressure until you feel resistance. Utilizing the paperclip, apply an upward force on the pin.

2. Thin Blades

thin blade knife

Whatever knife you get: be it an expensive knife or a cheap knife, you will have to shape it up a bit to create your ideal utility knife.

You only need a little bit of elbow grease, a set of nice metal files, and some quality time. You can create a masterpiece that will murder locks and look pretty fantastic in the process. You can build something that will murder locks and look pretty amazing in the process.

Consider how you want your knife pick to look before you start putting it in place. Once you have traced the shape of your pick on the knife with a marker, you will know exactly how much metal to shave off of it.

It is alright to work freehand, but setting some guidelines might help prevent you from wasting too much time grinding away. If you want to remove extra metal, you may always do so in the future, but be careful, because redoing it is out of the question.

Remove any extra metal that is surrounding the template with the file. As you get closer to the lines you specified, you need to be more careful and mindful of how much you remove from the document.

You may need to file down the sides of your pick to make it thinner. This will depend on how thick your knife is. If you can make the blade of your new lock pick thinner than a quarter of an inch, you should be able to open most locks without too much trouble.

If you want to take things one step further, you may polish your new pick using different grades of sandpaper if you want to take things to the next level. Polishing your pick will reduce the amount of friction that it encounters in the lock, allowing it to function better.

DON’T Forget Your Keys

While it might be funny to find yourself locked out of your own house, it would become a terrible bother if it keeps happening.

Make an effort to secure your keys with you at all times.

Still, if you ever find yourself in a predicament of any sort, you now know what you have to do. A knife may not be the ideal instrument for the job, but it is not the worst option available. It may be the best tool for you to educate yourself on how to pick a lock with a knife.

Having a good set of lock picking tools will help you to complete the operation.

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