Oh, boy.
You've probably never even seen a safe!
Well, we'd better start at the top.
You may be familiar with the standard, old-fashioned combination locks.
You turn the dial to the first number,
then you turn it the other direction to the second number,
then you turn back the first direction again,
go past the third number once and THEN keep going until you hit it again.
Forget all that. I do that part for you.
That's right, I'm Freddy, and I'm your hands in the safecracking business.
All you need to tell me is which numbers to try.
You say 24-16-22, and I do the rest.
But it's not quite that easy,
because knowing which numbers to try is the hard part!
It works like this. You make a guess, and I work the safe.
While I try those numbers,
I listen real good and try to figure out if any of them were in the combination.
If they are, I tell you what I find out.
I've got really good ears, and even the best safes have a hard time fooling me!
So what I hear is a click when we hit a good number,
and a snikt when we get a good number IN THE RIGHT SPOT.
Don't worry about which sound means what- I'll remind you.
Wait a minute- what if the same number appears twice in the combination?
Or in my guess?
So all you have to do is figure out which numbers to try next based on the numbers
we've already tried.
Now, before we give it a test run, there's one VERY IMPORTANT thing to know.
Most safes have this little flaw in them.
You don't have to hit the number exactly when you work the safe!
Yeah, the safe manufacturers don't want anybody to know that, but it's true.
Pretty much all safes work just fine if you hit within 2 of the right number.
For example, if you have a safe with three numbers, and you guess 24-16-22,
we'll get into the safe even if the real combo is 22-14-20 or even 26-18-24.
It's even easier than that.
If you just pretend that the safe only has numbers ending in 5 or 0,
you get all the other numbers for free. Why? Because when you say ?5,
we get a hit on ?3, ?4, ?5, ?6, or ?7. And when you say ?0, we get a
hit on ?8, ?9, ?0, ?1, or ?2. Hey, that's all of them!
You can use numbers ending in 2 and 7, or 3 and 8, or whatever you want.
I'd stick with 5 and 0, because they're neat numbers.
Be careful, though.
Some safes are more accurate,
and may require that you get right next to or right on the correct number.
In that case, the multiples of 5 won't be quite good enough.
Be sure to check the specs on the safe in the upper right before you make your first guess!
We can give it a try with a
test run.
