Medeco bumping

See:

The claim is that a set of less than 12 bump keys will open Medeco cylinders, together with a modified paperclip to move the M3 slider. presumably multiple sets would be required to deal with the various keyways used. Even then it seems somewhat hit and miss.

Since there are over 700 permutations of angles (let alone depths and 'fores' & 'afts'), it seems far fetched to imagine 12 keys would cover this range. Even if tolerances allowed a key to be cut with 'midway' angles this would still be 64 keys.

The only other thing I can think of is if the bump key imparts some spinning motion on the lower pin so the longitudinal slot is caught by the sidebar finger.

The whole ting seems somewhat farfetched.

There is no comment whether the cam version of the Medeco cylinder (where the whole mechanism is contained within an oversized plug) is vulnerable to bumping - it would appear less vulnerable than the norml type.

Perhaps an improved product would be the cam type mechanism to be fitted within a standard half inch plug. Only three depths may be possible but together with angles would provide a similar number of differs as for ordinary 6 pin cylinders.