Premium Viro Italian Padlock is defective?

A walk-in client chooses the VIRO padlock for his grille door. After few days come the above complaint. Just happened today.

Viro is such a famous padlock among the professional locksmith industries, worldwide. 100% all locksmiths know VIRO, as a extremely high quality padlock, including us. So what is this Viro padlock? (If you don’t know this brand yet, please, educate yourself)

Our most memorable memory with Viro is when one of our client in Stapok used it for 25 years, then comes the big flood (Kuching 2014’s famous big flood) entering to his house. The padlock is still locking his back grille, soaked in muddy flood water. 2 days later he return to his home. Still can unlock the Viro. Still works like usual except it’s really dirty, full with muds.

VIRO: 

1. Fully made in Italy
2. Anti Pick
3. Anti Bump
4. Anti Saw
5. Anti Bypass
6. Anti Cut
7. Extremely Durable

So what happen with today’s client? Comes complaint that it’s spoil already. Key goes in, can turn, but the shackle won’t detach. We tried, it’s true. Shackle seems stuck.

Under normal circumstances, we will have grind it, or drill it. But this is a VIRO. How can it be spoilt? A genuine Viro simply cannot be spoilt, especially if you said less than 1 week!

The only possibility, is the grease hardened. So we tried spray some WD-40 to it. After few spray, the shackle becomes workable. Work like new again. 

The client, however, do not believe Viro anymore and exchanged with a cheaper Yale. We understand the client’s worries, because he had never heard of this brand (he is the first for us). The padlock is indeed stuck initially when we tried. So we credited his refund.

Now you might ask, what is hardened grease? 

Every single padlock, with moving mechanical parts, needs grease. Just like car needs oil. Grease, if stay stationary/ no movement, might gets solidified. So a constantly used (got movement) padlock will not have hardened grease problem.

But Viro is a slow selling product, due to it’s high price. The Viro that we’re selling in Malaysia, we estimate is manufactured at least 5 years ago. So 5 years in a box without movement. Possibility of hardened grease is there. 

Same thing happened if you leave your home for long time, like few months. Some locks and padlocks do feels more sticky, or stuck. (We get some business from such cases as well)

The next time you come back from holiday, get some WD-40. Spray your locks before calling any locksmith.