This is just a basic overview of a beginners lock picking exercise that really helped me and will benefit any beginner lock picker. It involves emptying a cylinder of all the pin stacks except for one, and then using that one pin stack to explore the inner workings of the lock: springs, binding pins, set pins, over set pins, and tension required to set and keep pins set. The exercise involves progressively adding pin stacks in order to further gain knowledge about binding order.
This same exercise can also be used on more advanced locks that a lock picker is having a difficult time mastering.
When making this video, I found that I could have easily talked for a half hour about how to do this exercise. Just taking the cylinder apart would have eaten up 10 minutes, so I had to be brief in my presentation.
I hope it presents a good overview of what the exercise is all about and that it helps some other person just getting into this hobby.
![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/qHvOrXd2Sys/maxresdefault.jpg)