Broken Key Extraction in Toronto

Stop turning. What you do in the next minute decides whether this is a quick extraction or a new lock.

• Don't push the broken half back in to try to shove the piece out. It only drives it deeper.
• Don't use superglue on a stick to grab it. Glue that gets into the lock can ruin it.
• If a bit is sticking out, grip it with needle-nose pliers or tweezers and pull straight out, slowly. Don't twist.
• Keep both pieces. We can often cut a new key from them.

Yes. Car locks use flat wafers instead of pins, and a snapped blade usually sits wedged between them. We use thin extractor tools that hook the side of the blade and slide it back out. Most of the time the lock works fine afterwards.

• Door lock: done from outside the car. If the key broke because the lock was seized, we'll free it up and tell you if it needs more work.
• Trunk lock: same method. Trunk locks on many cars hardly get used, so they're often stiff or corroded, which is exactly why keys snap there.
• Ignition: if the cylinder is stuck partway, we turn it back to the lock position first, then pull the piece. A worn ignition is often what broke the key, so it may also need ignition repair.

With broken car key extraction on a chip key, the head is still worth keeping. We can test the chip and, depending on the car, reuse it in a new key or program a fresh one through car key replacement.

Yes. Most front door deadbolts and knobs in Toronto homes are Schlage, Kwikset or Weiser pin tumbler locks, and a snapped key usually comes out the same way. If the piece is deep or jammed, we can take the cylinder out of the door, push the fragment out from behind and put it back.

If the broken key has you stuck outside, that's a home lockout and getting you in comes first. If the lock was stiff before the key broke, it'll likely happen again, so ask about lock repair while we're there.

We also handle keys broken off in padlocks, garage side doors, sheds and filing cabinets.

Keys rarely snap out of nowhere. There's usually a warning first:

Usually just a key. If the two pieces fit back together cleanly, we can cut a new key from them, or from the lock's code. You only need a new lock if the cylinder was damaged when the key broke, or by someone digging at it with a screwdriver before we got there.

The price depends on where the key is stuck, how deep it is, and whether you need a new key or chip programming after. You'll hear it before we start, and there's no call-out fee.