Raking, in contrast, is a class of picking techniques in which several pin stack may be set at the shear line simultaneously. You may well have one of these locks on your house. Note that other pins may unset at this point, and may have to be picked again. If just one pin sets at the "other" shear line, the lock will not open even though all the pin stacks are picked. Practice distinguishing between the pin states and then finish picking the cylinder. It involves two players or two teams, each aiming to pocket their designated balls (stripes or solids) and then sink the 8-ball to win. The goal is to scatter the balls for subsequent shots. The billiard balls, formerly made of ivory or Belgian clay, are now usually plastic; they each measure from about 21/4 to 23/8 inches (5.7 to 6 cm) in diameter, the larger balls being used in carom billiards.

The origins of billiards date back to the 15th century in Europe. Note that while many locks pick predominantly back to front or front to back, there are exceptions, and you may find that the binding pin stack "jumps around" from the back to the front to the middle and so on. While applying light to moderate torque, push and pull a gently rounded rake pick from front to back and back to front along the pin stacks. Gradually ease up on the torque, allowing pins to drop one at a time. Eventually, you'll be able to comfortably pick the locks with five and six pins installed. High security locks are more routinely installed in Europe than they are in the United States. These are typically pin tumbler locks, but their orientation is "upside down" with respect to the convention for locks installed in the United States. Now release torque and try again, but this time lift the pins as little as you can when you test them, while still distinguishing between the two states. Get in the habit of making a systematic "inventory" of the states of the pin stacks after you set each new pin. Only one pin stack should be in a binding state at any given time, of course.

Repeat this exercise until you can reliably distinguish between a binding and a non-binding pin with very little lifting. Set/not-binding. The pin stack was already picked. Congratulations, you've picked the (two pin) lock. Tubular locks suffer from the same manufacturing imperfections as other locks and so can be picked with essentially the same techniques. Practice picking the two pin lock until you can do it easily and naturally. You may find one of the smaller LAB hook picks to be easier here than the larger Peterson picks, although you can usually still pick this keyway with the small Peterson hook. If only serrated top pins are used, reverse picking may be successful. Picking these locks involves putting torque on the locking bolt and raising the gates to the correct height. The usual scheme for master keying involves using more than one cut in some or all pin stacks (this is accomplished by adding additional pin segments). Picking locks very much involves "psychomotor" skill. An alternative technique, which I have not seen mentioned in the literature, is to first determine which pin stacks have security pins and which have regular pins (by picking normally and noting which stacks are false set).

Finally, lift the pin that sets first very high before you apply torque. See Figure 7 for an example of a serrated pin. Figure 7. LAB Serrated top pin. You'll need to be careful not to disturb the long pin when you push the short pin up. If you inadvertently push a pin up too far or are applying so much torque that more than one pin is binding, you may have an overset pin instead. You may want to use one of the smaller torque tools as well, or put your torque tool in the bottom part of the keyway instead of the (curvy) top. The Y1 keyway is one of the toughest you are likely to encounter in real lock installations in the US. Finally, for a real challenge, try the Yale "Y1" keyway locks. Again, try to find and lift all the pins with the different hook picks without applying any torque. You'll probably want to use one of the smaller LAB picks, although the small Peterson hook will sometimes do with care and practice. This technique requires a great deal of practice to master, but has the surprising property of sometimes being more effective against better made locks.

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