Key Cutting in White Rock

A blank is $4.75. Cutting a standard house or office key is $5-$15 each. Specialty and commercial blanks are $8-$30. Restricted high-security keys such as Mul-T-Lock, Medeco and Schlage Primus are $30-$80 each, cut to the registered code against written authorisation from the keyholder.

Bring the original to the counter at 4105 Macdonald St in Vancouver and standard keys are cut and tested while you wait, or we cut at your White Rock address on the truck, 30-45 minutes from dispatch. Blanks are listed under key blanks and the site-wide page is key cutting in Vancouver. Car keys and fob spares are a different job; see car key replacement in White Rock.

A worn key and a corroded key fail differently, and near the water in White Rock you get both.

Wear takes material off the peaks of the blade until it no longer lifts the pins to the shear line. Copying a worn key passes that wear straight to the copy, which is why the new one binds on the first cold morning. Corrosion is different: salt-laden damp pits the surface of the blade and the plug together, so the key drags even when the cuts are correct.

The fix for both is the same and it is not another copy. We decode the cylinder and cut to the lock as built, so the new key fits the way the original did when it was new. If the plug itself has corroded past saving, a replacement cylinder is $80-$160 installed and a coastal-rated one is worth the difference on a west-facing door. Every key we cut is tested against the original or in the lock before it leaves, and if it does not turn we cut another.

White Rock and South Surrey properties collect outdoor locks: garden gates, beach sheds, boat and kayak storage, garage side doors, greenhouse and workshop padlocks. Each one usually arrives with its own key, and the result is a keyring nobody carries and a spare hidden under a planter.

Two fixes. Keyed-alike padlock sets so one key runs the shed, gate and storage compound, using shrouded-shackle bodies and stainless hasps that survive the salt rather than plated ones that seize by February. And keying the house and garage alike, which is a rekey at $25-$45 per cylinder rather than new hardware, and it ends the hidden-key habit for good.

Restricted keys are the other end. The blank is patented and controlled, so only an authorised cutter holds it. We cut Mul-T-Lock, Medeco and Schlage Primus to the registered code at $30-$80 per key against written authorisation, which is what a Johnston Road business or a strata council uses to make sure a key that leaves cannot come back as three copies. See high-security locks, lock rekeying and the home list on residential locksmith in White Rock.