Segal Bullring-shackle Padlock

mercurial

Below are some pictures of quite a large bullring shackle style padlock, made by Segal.

If anybody can provide any information as to approximate age and value(if any), that would be much appreciated.

It is interesting to see such a hefty padlock, with only a 4 pin cylinder! There are no security pins(spools/mushrooms etc), either. Very very easy to pick - with feather light tension.

They certainly seem to have gone out of their way to make it shim-proof, and pulling/wedging resistant, though….

In case it is not visible in the pictures, the stamp on the shackle simply says ‘Segal’.

…mercurial

Angusbuddy

I remember an article from one of the US journals a few years back mentioning that Segal was a NY lock company started by NYPD officer by the same name. The Padlock Collector shows the company as being in existance from 1920 until 1955. They are a pretty common lock here in the states the one you show would have a worth of about $35 to $70 to a collector. Hope this helps?

mercurial

That is a lot more information than I had soi far about the lock - it certainly helps, thankyou.

The coloured coating on the lock would suggest to me that it dates closer to 1955, however close inspection of construction, hand finishing & particularly the shackle (doesn’t show well in the pics) would suggest it is closer to the 1920 end of the Segal lock company’s existance.

Thankyou,

…mercurial

Angusbuddy

Here’s a link to a site for the history of the company that might add a little more light on the maker.

http://www.segallock.com/history.shtml

mercurial

Thankyou for the link.

According to their history, as a police officer, Mr Segal recognised a need to protect homes from burglars who were ‘jimmying’ or spreading door frames - so he aimed to design rimlocks to protect against these attacks.

Obviously, they branched out into making padlocks at some point.

Mr Segal seems to have applied the same design philosophy to this padlock, given the way the shackle is secured.

…mercurial

mercurial

I managed to find the patent for this lock design, it is US Patent 1387187 and it was issued in 1921.

http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=KMpKAAAAEBAJ&dq=1387187

The lock pictured in the patent is a smaller model - it has only two locking dogs (in this case ‘fins’ attached to a shaft turned by the cylinder)for each side of the shackle, as opposed to the three in my example.

Mr Segal’s name is mistakenly recorded as “SEOAL” - this made it a bit hard to locate the patent previously.

I assume the lock could have been made as early as 1921, but I have no idea when production ceased. It seems the Segal logo changed from the logo on the bow of the key pictured above, to a similar shaped logo with the letters “Segalock” and has changed again since then.

…mercurial

Dean Nickel

I beleave that logo was good until sometime in the 1980’s. I hope someone from the east coast of the US chimes in becouse outside of the North east part of the US that lock company isn’t well known… I am 3000 miles removed. I will look in some trade mags and see what I can find.