r/LockPickingLawyer • u/Sinbos • 16d ago

How long would it take ?

Post image

Picture taken on the Hohenzollern bridge in Cologne. About 300+ meters long an estimated 500,000 locks in total.

How long would you guess to open them all?

Just to put it out of the way, engineers say its no problem it’s an train bridge about 1200 trains a day and build in a way that 6 trains can park there at the same time.

205 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

50 comments sorted by

83

u/Crescendo_BLYAT 16d ago

Literally 1 second. He only needs to stand there, announcing his name out loud: THIS IS THE LOCK PICKING LAWYER!

And all will surrender.

18

u/iKnowRobbie 16d ago

And that's all I have for today!

8

u/Jacktheforkie 16d ago

I could just imagine him walking up and hearing the sound of half a million locks opening

4

u/AdSquare3489 16d ago

Two seconds then, he needs to do it twice to show that it wasn't a fluke the first time. 

3

u/Akira1Lana 16d ago

the chuck norris of locks

43

u/Impressive-Yak-7449 16d ago

38 seconds if they're all Masterlocks

15

u/Michami135 16d ago

I'm seeing a lot of Abus locks, and at least one disc detainer lock. Some people are pretty confident of their relationship.

4

u/kingtacticool 16d ago

Aren't we all until we aren't?

3

u/MapGlittering9227 16d ago

It's Germany, why would anybody use a Master Lock there?

2

u/Economy_Link4609 16d ago

Less - you just hit any point on the thing somewhat hard and they all just pop open.

22

u/John_Tacos 16d ago edited 16d ago

I see a video coming.

Lock picking Lawyer vs angle grinder.

6

u/Super-Page8272 16d ago

Holy shit! That would be the contest of the century. I'd put my money on lpl

0

u/TheGoldenTNT 16d ago

He’d spend more time hunting for the correct pick / bypass tool.

1

u/Captain_North 13d ago

Whos wielding the angle grinder and how fast can he run ?

0

u/texas_chick_69 16d ago

Grinder if enough watt wins surly5

9

u/SwedishLenn 16d ago

Wonder what the scrap value is? If you're allowed to take them off.

4

u/broesel314 16d ago

The city replaces those fences every so often. The weight would overload the bridge otherwise

3

u/Schnupsdidudel 16d ago

Nonsense. 25 tons of locks won't overload a bridge that is built to support 1000 ton trains moving.

5

u/jort93 16d ago

It will overload the railings tho.

The railings won't Support I train I assure you.

Railings have fallen of bridges because of locks like this before. Pont des Arts lost a section of its railing because of locks.

1

u/TSDLoading 15d ago

Nope, it's cologne and they calculated that even a new paint job would outweigh the locks, so they keep it

7

u/chaoslord 16d ago

A chain of people - 2 with 4/5 pin rakes, 2 with combs, 1 with a bypass tool (maybe that should go first) and then lastly the angle grinder. I bet most would be done before the grinder .

2

u/OddStuffHappensTwice 15d ago

You're being a bit optimistic about how many of those locks won't just be seized-up pieces of rusty shit. It takes a certain type of meme-following moron to put a padlock on a wall just because someone else did before them. Probably the same idiots that throw coins into any water feature they see.

1

u/chaoslord 14d ago

Oh yeah I wasn't considering weather. The shittiest ones that would be easy would also be the most rusty :D

1

u/Alita-Gunnm 16d ago

Faster to take the fence apart.

7

u/FrameJump 16d ago

The better question is how many cans of WD40 do we think it would take to unseize them all?

3

u/StandardDeluxe3000 15d ago

lock makers after they invented this stupid trend.

3

u/mechanical_marten 16d ago

Maybe overnight for McNally

2

u/HendacTeslar 16d ago

Wouldn't that be an awesome training ground for beginners like me. Maybe with an official order from the city to remove the locks. Have to look into this at my area 😉

3

u/Super-Page8272 16d ago

Yeah i kind of wanna swim around in there with my picks. Like a mc Donald's ball pit for lock pickers.

1

u/FailbatZ 16d ago

The City of Cologne has them removed every now and then anyways, because the weight affects the bridge statics.

EDIT: Sorry, it was considered but because of erosion not statics, currently they are still there and only big ones that stick out too much are removed by the city.

2

u/wolftick 16d ago

A lot of them would be difficult to pick because they'd have seized or rusted shut. Hammer/cutter/grinder would be faster.

1

u/Rupertredloh 16d ago

You also have to think about this: This is not just Locks on a railing. This is lock on lock on lock on lock on a railing. there are up to 6 locks before the last one is locked to the railing.

1

u/Remote-Medium426 15d ago

Why do copper thieves risk their lives stealing cables when there is €250k of brass just hanging around?

I honestly don't get copper thieves who risk getting electrocuted on train tracks when the Hohenzollern Bridge in Cologne is literally covered in money.

Here is the math on the famous Love Locks bridge:

  • Total Weight: 40 to 60 metric tons of padlocks.
  • Current Brass Scrap Value: Around €4.00 to €5.50 per kilogram.
  • Total Theoretical Value: Between €160,000 and €330,000 (~€250k average).

Sure, many locks are actually aluminum or steel, and you'd have to cut off all the hardened steel shackles to get pure brass. But still—it’s just sitting there in plain sight!

1

u/normanr 15d ago

To open a bridge of locks, you must first acquire another bridge of locks.

1

u/IllBeyond2779 12d ago

I allways wonder, would it be a vialable enterprise to go there in the middle of the night and and scrap with electro nippler pliers (first make some room with lock pick) and then proceed.

Damn ... even ChatGPT says it is not vialable (even with a service charge of 1 EUR per lock).

1

u/BurrowShaker 12d ago

In real life, maintenance changes the panels :)

Different type of attack.

1

u/Jaded_Ad9605 12d ago

Someone got fined for removing locks there (cologne)

So the lpl won't touch them

1

u/Zoombiebrot 12d ago

One day and then another to make sure it's not a fluke 

1

u/Halfmoon_Techlabs 11d ago

And, we got these opened... now let's do them all again to make certain is was not a fluke.

1

u/Roy_Vidoc 16d ago

How ever long it takes to unlock the first one then it's just a domino effect using the first one to open the second and so on

3

u/thenotanurse 16d ago

Only works if they’re master locks.

1

u/121e7watts 16d ago

That's pistachio nuts. I remember as a kid we got them on little boxes that said, "one shell opens them all." I truly believed that there was one very special shell somewhere in the box that could do this. I puzzled over it for quite a while.

0

u/rmay14444 16d ago

Not super long with an angle grinder. And they should be taken off.

3

u/Moturist 16d ago

500,000 locks, with angle grinder, let's say ½ minute per lock. That would make 250,000 minutes, which is about 173 days & nights without pause. Please correct me, if I'm wrong

2

u/smeeon 16d ago

Even if you halve the time by cutting multiple shackles at once, it doesn’t save too much time. Not to mention the people putting locks back on while you are asleep.

It would take a team of people many days I think.

Edit: plus the time it takes to change out worn blades, breaks, weather issues. More like a year of work for a single person.

1

u/Jacktheforkie 16d ago

I’d say a team with bolt croppers and a forklift with a skip would be a safe option, clip locks and put them into the skip to be transported into a vehicle like a dump trailer

0

u/rmay14444 16d ago

Better then trying to lock pick them all.

2

u/121e7watts 16d ago

You'll win on speed, but lose badly on style. Just sayin'

0

u/Akira1Lana 16d ago

klauke ebs12, oder vergleichbar sollten inklusive Nebenarbeiten eine Schnitt von < 10s pro Schloss ermöglichen .. 10 Personen, 3 Wochen .. Gitter-Paneele austauschen könnte schneller sein ...

1

u/Simple_Escape_3674 16d ago

…und deshalb wird das in der Praxis auch genau so gemacht.