Most locks do not need replacing; they need new pins, a lubricated cylinder or a strike moved a few millimetres. We start with the least invasive fix and only move up the list when the hardware has genuinely reached the end of its life.
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Most locks do not need replacing; they need new pins, a lubricated cylinder or a strike moved a few millimetres. We start with the least invasive fix and only move up the list when the hardware has genuinely reached the end of its life.
When a call is about upgrading locks, our first questions are about the doors rather than the products: how many there are, what they are made of, whether there is glass beside the lock, who holds keys today and what the rooms behind them hold. Those answers tell us which cylinder formats and which level of key control to bring, so the visit ends with a plan rather than a brochure.
The key you reach for. The door you come home to. Good locksmith work begins with understanding how you use them.
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Locksmith services
The right service depends on what you want to happen next. Keep the same lock but stop an old key working? That is rekeying. Upgrade to something sturdier? That is replacement. Lost every copy of a car key? That is a different job again. Read on to match your need.
Home Lockout ServiceThe moving truck has left, half the boxes are inside, and the single key the previous owner handed over turns the knob but not the deadbolt.
Business Lockout ServiceA cook stepped into the alley with the recycling and the rear door swung shut behind him.
Broken Key ExtractionOvernight the deadbolt froze, and this morning the key would only turn partway.
Break-In Damage Lock RepairSomeone smashed the little window beside the door, reached in and turned the thumb-turn.
Seized & Jammed Lock OpeningEvery time you pull the key out of the side door it comes away gritty.
Lost Keys — Same-Visit RekeyYou were shovelling the driveway after dark and the ring must have slid out of your coat pocket somewhere under a metre of snow.
Lock RekeyingThe whole key ring went missing somewhere between the grocery store and the bus.
Deadbolt InstallationThe old deadbolt has grown lazy.
Lock Replacement & UpgradeThe lever on the side door droops toward the floor and rattles in your hand.
Vintage Mortise Lock ServiceThe old skeleton key still fits the keyhole, but it now needs a jiggle, a lean on the door and a little luck before the bolt moves.
Smart Lock InstallationArthritis has made the small house key hard to grip and turn, especially with gloves on in January.
Gate & Building Entry LocksThe gate to the side yard used to close with a satisfying click.
Mailbox Lock ReplacementThe property manager mentioned that half the compartments in the lobby's mailbox panel are original to the building and are starting to fail one by one, key by key, as tenants turn over year after year.
A key turned up in the parking lot with the shop's name on its fob. It came back to you, which is lucky, but it means keys are leaving the building on rings you have never seen, and the shop's locks have not changed since opening day.
Commercial RekeyingYou moved in three weeks ago. The previous owner left a handful of keys, none labelled, and the bolt on the side door rattles in its housing. You would like every exterior door to bolt, and to know exactly who can open it.
Deadbolt InstallationMinus eighteen with a wind, and the exterior cylinder on the shop door has frozen solid overnight after yesterday's slush. The key goes in halfway and stops. The delivery driver is due, the phone is ringing inside, and nobody can reach it.
Business Lockout ServiceHigh security
Restricted and patented key systems mean the blank for your key is not sold in shops. A copy can only be cut by an authorised locksmith against a signature, so the number of keys in existence stays known. That control is often worth more than the hardware.
You run a home office with client files and equipment, and your insurer has asked what kind of lock is on the door.
The lever on the side door droops toward the floor and rattles in your hand.
The old deadbolt has grown lazy.
Someone smashed the little window beside the door, reached in and turned the thumb-turn.
Commercial
Businesses need locks that fit how the building is used: who opens up, who closes, who can reach the stockroom. Commercial services cover rekeying, master keys, heavy-duty hardware, exit devices and electronic access for shops, offices and warehouses.
High security
The new manager took over the shop last month and only now needs the back-office safe open, but the combination the previous owner was supposed to leave in writing never turned up anywhere in the handover file.
A homeowner inherited a heavy old dial safe from a parent's house, moved it into the new place, and has no idea whether the bolt-work still works, whether the lock is sound, or how it should be anchored.
Sensible optionReplace it with a weather-rated padlock.
WhyA shrouded shackle and a drainage-friendly body cope with rain and salt far better than an indoor lock left outside.
Sensible optionA hasp and a proper padlock.
WhyThe hasp matters as much as the lock; fitted with carriage bolts it resists prying.
Sensible optionReplace the mailbox lock and cut new keys.
WhyWith proof the box is yours, the cam lock swaps out cleanly and you get two keys for it.
Sensible optionSafe Opening & Combination Change
WhyTwo different problems can look identical from outside a locked safe: a combination that genuinely no longer opens it, and a mechanism that is jammed, corroded or blocked while the correct numbers still work perfectly.
Sensible optionSafe Installation & Servicing
WhyBusinesses call for this service for two different reasons that sometimes overlap: protecting cash held overnight, and protecting paper records that would be enormously slow to recreate.
Sensible optionHigh Security Locks
WhyUpgrading to high security rarely means new doors or a big disruption.
Describe the property, the hardware and what has changed, and the visit starts from what you have seen.
01
Has it been forced, does it drag, who has had keys? Those answers tell us whether the frame, the cylinder or the key list needs attention first.
02
A box strike and three-inch screws into the studs, long hinge screws, and filled holes where the wood has split, before any cylinder is changed.
03
Doors open, doors closed, both sides, then a push on the locked door to feel for play. We finish by writing down what was fitted.
Haldimand-Norfolk, Ontario
2021 Census
About 62% of homes in Norfolk County were built in 1980 or earlier, according to the 2021 Census.
Basement and side entries on older homes were often fitted long after the house was built, with whatever lock was on hand. Bringing those doors up to the standard of the front entry, and onto the same key, is a common and satisfying job.
Single-detached houses make up about 83% of homes in Norfolk County (2021 Census).
Where most homes are detached houses, each one has several exterior doors: front, side, back, garage entry, sometimes a walkout. Getting them all onto one key is the most requested job, and it usually takes a single visit.
Walk the property and note every door the missing key opened, including the garage, shed and gate. Gather any keys you still have, since a working key helps in reading each cylinder. Have identification and, for tenants, something showing the tenancy. Decide roughly how many keys you want and whether you would like all doors on one key. If a garage remote or building fob was lost too, mention it when you book.
Plan on an hour or two for a typical house with three or four cylinders, including the walk-through, identification, pinning, cutting and testing. Each additional cylinder adds a little, as does swapping a cylinder to bring a mismatched door onto the same key, resetting a homeowner-rekeyable lock or clearing a garage opener. The locksmith gives a realistic window on the phone once the list of doors is known.
You can, and it solves being without a key. It leaves the lost one working, though, which is the half of the problem that keeps people awake. Rekeying takes about as much effort as a trip to a hardware store counter and ends with a new key in your hand and the old one retired. If the key was mislaid somewhere it will never be found and named nothing, a plain copy is a fair choice.
Three things working together. The cylinder has a second locking mechanism, usually a sidebar released by finger pins or rotating pins, plus hardened steel in the path of a drill, so picking, bumping and drilling take far longer than on an ordinary lock. The deadbolt and strike are heavier and fastened into the framing. And the key is cut on a patented or restricted blank that only an authorised person can have copied. Remove any one and the door is weaker than the label suggests.
Hardware for Norfolk County homes is chosen for the door, not the catalogue. We look at the thickness, the bore, the backset, the swing and the finish already on the house, then bring options that fit without new holes or mismatched brass. The result looks as though it was always there, and it locks the way the door deserves.
