Broken key in the lock: what to do?

It’s here tile par excellence: your key breaks in the lock when you activate it. You find yourself gate close or not with one end of the key in your hands and the other well stuck inside the lock. Rest assured, there are solutions.

Broken key in the lock: flat pliers or hooked steel rod

If with a little luck, the broken key protrudes a few millimeters, it is possible to handle it with flat pliers or even, why not, with tweezers. Otherwise, a solution is to try to remove the end of the key with a thin rod ofsteel crocheted at the end. It will allow you to pry and get the piece of key out of the lock. You can first apply a lubricant which will help to drag the key. The operation – which will leave your lock intact – then consists first of straighten the lock, using a screwdriver for example, so that it returns to its basic position. Then use the pliers or the rod to extract the stuck piece of key.

Note that there are also extractors of keys sold in kits of several thicknesses. These kits contain a handle and a hooked rod that will help you activate the lock pin. Most of the time, this is the solution employed by locksmiths. The difficulty here remains to find the extractor adapted to your lock.

The handyman’s solution when a key is broken in the lock

Be careful, this solution is risky, because you could jam the whole lock. Put a tiny bit of glue glue, or on a wire of iron, a hanger-like rod made of metal, or on the other part of the key and introduce the glued element so that it presses against the broken end. The operation requires a lot of precautions, because the glue must not flow into the lock, at the risk of permanently damaging it. Then let the glue set for a few moments. It should then be possible to perform a slight, smooth rotation to remove the key.

This solution can also work with syringes of welding cold, but it requires knowing in which position the key was before breaking.

Change barrel

You can also try, after removing the lock cylinder, the barrel, to fill it with penetrating oil then, by tapping, to put the broken key back in the axis. Finally, enter another key outside, and tap sharply with a hammer.

Note that it is possible, once the piece of key has been extracted from the lock, to make a duplicate of the key – in other words, to recover an operational key – by presenting the two broken pieces. But ultimately, perhaps the simplest and fastest solution, but above all the most radical, is to go and buy another barrel with its keys!

Reminder: first of all, check if this type of event is covered by your home insurance. It could save you a lot of hassle.