• How To Crack Sentry Safe

Opinions expressed by Forbes. It took my partner and me about a minute to figure out what Terry to replicate the safe-crack. Sentry is owned.

This is a little different from the normal lockpicking discussed here, but I have a problem and was wondering if anyone had some advice. My mother has a firesafe in her basement. We can't even remember what, if anything, is in it, and she lost the combination years ago. I've recently taken up a bit of lockpicking and have been finding it quite interesting. I was thinking of trying my hand at opening the safe.

How To Crack Sentry Safe

So my question is, can it be done, and does anyone have any tips? I'm not sure the exact model of the safe. It's made by Sentry, it's fairly small, and probably about 7-10 years old. It looks very similar to this one Sadly it does not have a keyway to pick, only a combination. So any advice? Most fire safes have a removable panel with a manual key override somewhere. Fire safes aren't designed to be strong or manipulation resistant, they're only to protect the contents from fire (strangely enough).

So the locks are almost always shitty single sided wafer locks which a one armed monkey could open in seconds flat. If you're 100% sure there is no keyway, I'd assume the lock isn't electronic.

The safe you linked to says it's a 3 wheel combination, so is that the deal with yours or what? To be honest, I'm not 100% sure. I haven't looked too closely at it. I was hoping the fact that it's not really meant for security means it wouldn't be too difficult to manipulate it open. However if there really is a hidden wafer lock keyway, that would be an easy way to get it open. Though I'd love to be able to figure out the combination so it could still be used afterwards. It does have a combination dial as shown, I don't actually know if it has a wafer lock somewhere.

I just looked at the front of it, and didn't see an obvious locks. It's definitely mechanical and not electric. Pretty sure the combination is 3 numbers. Electronic safes always have a key override, so yours might and might not. Usually it's on the face under a plastic panel, won't be too obvious but if it's there you'll definitely find it. Failing that, you can decode the combination.

I don't know much about combination locks so I wouldn't trust my life to this, but generally speaking you insert a probe (see peterson mini knife) into the top of the gap on the left side of the wheel and push gently. Turn the wheel until the probe pops into a small notch, then move to the next wheel. From here it shouldn't open, the combination is almost correct but the wheels are all a couple of numbers off so you need to turn them all by one position and try to open it, then repeat. I think 2-4 numbers up or down is the norm. For example if you get a reading of 121 you turn it to 232 then 343 etc until it opens.

Aaaaand if that doesn't work, if it's only a 3 digit code you can brute force it relatively quickly. Try obvious combinations first such as 1X1, 2X2 etc where X = 0 through 9. Then try 012, 123, 234 etc right up until 901 and then do the same in reverse. If you get through all of those with no open, unfortunately you're gonna have to just start at 000 and go through them all. This isn't a problem with most padlocks cos you can just pull on the shackle and run through them in just a few minutes but with a fire safe you'll probably have to push a button or pull a lever each time. I dunno, I haven't got it in front of me so that's the best I can tell ya. I am by no means familiar with safes, so take what I say with some caution.

This video by Kokomolock shows the inside mechanism of a typical safe. A while back I was watching a Defcon talk about safes, I can't remember which video it was, sorry. During the video, the presenter mentioned something about using a power-sander to vibrate the discs in the lock. This would cause the heavier part of the disc to 'set' to the bottom and the section where the cut is made to align at the top. I have never seen a video of this working, and I am not sure if it would set off a re-locker mechanism, but I doubt that a fire-safe would have a re-locker mechanism. If your fire safe uses the same type of discs as the one that Kokomolock's does, then this won't work.

They cut part of the discs out so that the discs won't 'set'. This is all I can help you with, sorry. Let us know if you get it open.