This is how you might save your broken key

Have you ever experienced this? Your key gets stuck in the lock. You apply a little bit of pressure and wriggle the key back and forth a bit, only to break it off and be left with half a key in your hand and half a key in the lock. What should you do next? You could call a locksmith, but those are often quite expensive and not always necessary. You could also follow our tips and remove the broken key from the lock yourself!

Play locksmith for a day.

Locksmith

A locksmith isn’t our best friend per se. Of course, they can fix the problem at hand within a couple of minutes, but they also charge a lot of money. Especially at night, in the weekend or during holidays, they might charge you up to a few hundred euros. And, of course, your key decided to break at the most inconvenient of times. Luckily, we’ve got a bunch of tips that’ll save you a high bill.

Broken key

Can you spot a piece of the key sticking out of the lock? Use a bit of oil or WD-40 to grease the lock with. WD-40 is the best option because you can use the long, thin spout to spray as close to the key as possible. Carefully spray the oil into the lock, in between the key and the cilinder. Don’t be afraid to be generous with the oil. Next, use a pair of pliers to pull out the broken key.

Too deep

Has the key broken inside the lock and are you unable to reach it? Don’t despair, because you can still easily fix it with a couple of tools. For example, you could use a strong magnet to pull out the remnant of the key. Of course, not everybody owns a strong magnet and the key might be too stuck for this trick to work. You can also use a pair of tweezers or a straightened out paperclip. If all of this isn’t working, you might consider putting a little bit of glue on the other half of the key and then pushing it back into the lock, straight onto the stuck piece of key. Once the glue has dried, you can pull out the key in its entirety.

Not having any success with these methods? Go to the next page to read about the ultimate method that is definitely foolproof!

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