Figure 3. The plaque attached to safe door gives the name and origin of manufacturer. I received a call from a gentle- man on a Wednesday aſternoon. He said he needed his safe opened before he could take it to the sal- vage yard. I couldn’t help for a couple of days, but he said that wasn’t a problem. The safe had been outside with a tarp over it for 50-plus years, and a couple more days weren’t going to hurt. I asked him to send pictures, but he needed to have his son send them because he didn’t have “one of those new phones.” I said I needed a full picture of the safe, hinges, castors (if the safe had any), dial and handle. The gentleman said the safe didn’t have a dial or handle; just a keyhole and knob. Aſter a couple of days, I received four pictures of the safe. As the gentleman stated, there was no handle or dial — just a keyway for a flat steel key, a knob to re- tract the lock bolt and another porcelain knob to pull open the door. The other thing that stood out was how rusted it was (see Figures 1 and 2). A plaque on the safe read: “J M D Da- vidson, Manufacturer, Albany NY (Fig- ure 3). As I always do, I started with Dave McOmie’s books but didn’t find anything. Since the safe was manufactured in Albany, www.savta.org Figure 4. The safe door is open. The yellow circle shows where the author drilled to get a better purchase to pry open the door. “Prying on the door, I suspected there could be door bolts on the top and bottom.” NY, I texted a friend of mine in that area. I never heard back, so I asked NSO for help. Several people sent me pictures of what appeared to be similar to the lock I have, with drill point (DP) to match. Taking a First Look Aſter arriving on site and looking over the safe, the customer gave me a key stamped with the same number as the keyway. I was told on NSO that the key didn’t turn — it only aligned the levers so the bolt could be retracted. The key went in, and the knob turned both leſt and right, but the door was so rusted that it wouldn’t open. I sprayed rust remover on the door as I used a carpet knife to scrape three sides of the safe and rapped Figure 5. The lock is missing, and you can see the 2⅛" hole used to drill off the locking bolts. on the safe door. Aſter a while, the door moved slightly, but not enough to open. I put a hole next to the door edge to get a prybar on the door for more pur- chase (Figure 4). Aſter slow progress, I decided to put a 3⁄16" hole into the lock to look around inside. The DP I choose was 1⅜" up, ⅝" right of center keyway. The purpose of the hole was so I could see the levers lined up on the stump, but the bolt wouldn’t retract as the knob was turned. Prying on the door, I suspected there could be door bolts on the top and bot- tom. Not having any pictures of the in- side, I wanted to put another hole in the safe to look around. Instead, I unscrewed the porcelain knob and used my Teslong scope. I found two bolts attached to the lock bolt: top and bottom. Both were rusted/corroded, but the fireproofing was also blocking the bolts from retracting. I made a decision to drill a 2⅛" hole where the vertical bar was located to release the lock bolt and hopefully pull down or up on the door bars to release the door. The owner was going to trash the safe, so a 2⅛" hole wasn’t going to make a difference; he just wanted it open. I didn’t want to trash the lock (Figure 4). November/December 2021 | SAFE & VAULT TECHNOLOGY 17