Good morning everybody. My name is Stephen and I am representing the Kansas City chapter of
TOOL. And today we're going to do a really short video for you on cuff stuff. We're going to talk
about handcuffs. We're going to tell you the different pieces of them. We're going to tell
you about the key and how the key works. We're going to tell you how the inner workings work.
And we're going to tell you how, if you don't have a key, to get yourself out of a nice pair
of handcuffs. Now, this is going to be a disclaimer first. Remember, if the police
put you in handcuffs because they're arresting you or detaining you, it is very ill-advised
to get yourself out of the handcuffs. If you do that, we take no responsibility for that, number
one. And number two, you're going to find yourself in a much worse situation than you were in before.
This is just to be used for fun. This is not to be used to get yourself out of handcuffs if you
have been detained or arrested by the police. Again, TOOL takes no responsibility for that.
We are merely here to teach you the inner workings of the various locking mechanisms that exist in
the world and their various flaws. So, let's start with a very simple pair of handcuffs.
A handcuff is made up of multiple different pieces. This is the ratchet arm. Now, the ratchet
arm is what swings and allows it to go around your wrist. We also have the housing. We have the
little keyhole. Inside of our housing, we have what's called the pawl or the P-A-W-L. It is a
set of teeth that actually is what causes your ratchet arm teeth to lock in and not be able to
be pulled free. Now, underneath your pawl, you're going to have a spring. The spring is what allows
the pawl to be compressed down to let you out. And it's also what pushes the pawl back up in
order to make sure that the handcuffs don't get tighter or don't get looser. That's the whole
point of it. So, let's take a look at our key. This is a handcuff key. It's very, very simple.
You see, it's very small. It's made of solid metal. And all it has is just this one little
notch in here. Now, that's because inside of here, what we have is we have a little metal lip.
So, what happens is when you insert your key, your key is going to connect onto that metal lip.
And as you push it down, it's compressing the spring. And it's what allows your handcuff ratchet
arm to freely spin. Now, you can see that when I let go of it, now the pawl engages your ratchet
arm. And you can hear the little clicks. And that's what's keeping it in there. So, what you've
really got is you've got little teeth that are down in here. And you've got teeth that are on
your ratchet arm. Your ratchet arm teeth are going to engage your pawl teeth. And they're going to
set in. When you try to pull it backwards, it doesn't work because the teeth are interlocking.
That's what keeps you safe from being able to get out of them. But it's also what
tries to keep you safe from being able to further ratchet it down. That way, you know,
you don't get it too tight around your wrists. Now, if for some reason we find ourselves without
a key, let's say we find ourselves maybe handcuffed to a bed. I don't know your situation and I don't
judge. So, what would we use in that case? So, one of the main tools that we would use is a very
simple lock pick. And this is just called a lifter. Now, if we look at our lifter, we can see that it
is very, very similar to our key. All it is, it's just a very simple hook. So, we want to mimic the
motion of the handcuff key into the lock. So, we locate our lock, we take our lifter,
we slide it into the very top, and all we're going to do is go up and to the right and twist
just a little bit until we have engaged the metal lip in the pawl and compress the spring down,
pushing the pawl back down in order to open our handcuffs. So, let me demonstrate that one more
time. We're going to take our lifter, we are going to put it right into our keyhole, we're
going to move it up and to the right, and then we're just going to give it a very simple and
light twist. Once you feel it engage, all you need to do is pull the arm, the ratchet arm out,
and then you can let go because now you've gotten yourself out of that. Now, you can really use a
lot of other different picks. You could use a half diamond if you wanted, or really whatever
one you have around. It just needs to fit properly into the hole and it needs to mimic what the key
looks like, or as close as you can get to that. Because remember, all that exists within here
is just a little metal lip and that is all that you are touching. So, as long as your tool can
touch that lip and is strong enough to push it down and maintain the downward pressure while you
pull the ratchet arm out, that's really all you need to be able to do that. There's also another
way with which you can do that if you don't, for some reason, have access to the keyhole or you
don't have anything that's going to work in there. And what we would use is called a shim. A shim is
a very, very, very thin piece of metal. You can make them out of titanium, which lasts a lot longer,
or you can make them out of a simple pop can. Now, if you're going to make them out of a pop can,
just remember they're not going to last nearly as long because they are very, very, very thin,
lightweight aluminum. So, in order for a shim to work, you're just going to stick it right down in
between your ratchet arm and your paw. And what that shim is doing is it's pushing those teeth
out of the way and it's making it so that there can't be a connection between the teeth on your
ratchet arm and the teeth on your paw. Keep in mind that when you do this, you are most likely
going to end up tightening the handcuff one to two notches as you push the piece of metal into there.
So, if it's already very tight or you're already at the very end because you have small wrists or
the person put them on too tight, this method may not work or it may put it in so tight that it
starts to cut off the circulation and it starts to actually hurt you. So, please be aware of that.
If you want to test it and play with it, make it multiple notches too big for your hand. That way,
when you push the shim in and it locks it down a couple notches, you're not hurting yourself. You're
just putting it right where it should be in the first place. So, that is a very, very simple
overview of a handcuff, of how a handcuff works, and how you can get yourself out of one. Remember,
the handcuff key is very, very simple and all you need in order to mimic it is a simple tool
such as a lockpick lifter or a lockpick half diamond. Anything that mimics the key is going
to work. It's going to be able to get you out of there. And once again, I will remind you,
if you get placed in handcuffs by the authorities, please do not try to get yourself out. And we
absolutely do not and will not condone that. You will find yourself in much worse trouble.
If you have further questions about handcuffs, or you want to talk about some of the more advanced
types of handcuffs, or even the international handcuffs, please find the right channel in the
Defcon Lockpick Village and we would be more than happy to discuss this with you.
Thank you so much for watching.