Old Diebold Safe
A fellow from church, well into his 80's, asked me to help him with an old Diebold safe that he bought at auction years ago, and has since lost the combination to. I did a little reading in the limited resources I had amassed at that point, and drove with him out to the family farm, 23 miles from town. His kids run it now, as he and his (deceased) wife moved to town about 25 years ago when he retired. (at that point I didn't know what kind of safe it was, as he couldn't remember that either.) At this point, it's idle curiosity that has him wanting to open the safe, and as I want to learn the craft, I'm really more interested in learning about the lock type, so that I can determine possible factory combinations, and its manipulation, rather than going straight to destructive entry. Getting ahead of myself. I got out to the farm, saw what it was, and gulped, because I knew immediately that this was not going to be an easy or quick task.
Here are a few pictures
I was told elsewhere that it was likely a Diebold K Lock, a tidbit for which I was thankful. If I could find even a scrap of information on Diebold K Locks I'd be even more thankful! I'm researching, and gathering further resources, and I was reminded that I hadn't checked in over here for way too long.
While I am doing this as a part of my locksmithing, because I am learning, and because I have no experience, I'm not going to charge the guy more than 20 or 30 bucks for gas. He's a sweet old guy, and wanted to buy me dinner on the return trip from the farm, which gives you an idea to his generosity and trust. I politely declined, as I was expected for dinner at home. Next time out, maybe I'll sit down to dinner with him, we had a great conversation about farming on the way out, and about the wheat harvest on the way home. It's been about a year since he lost his wife, and I could tell that he didn't get to sit and talk as much as would like.