Do you lock your toolbox at home?

[vavet]

If your toolbox is at home, in a locked garage/workshop, do you lock it?

If so, why?
Is it because your wife comes out to get a big wrench to use as a hammer?
Is it related to the safety and keeping things out of the hands of little ones - kids or grandkids?
Is it to prevent your teenaged/pre-teen children from randomly using and misplacing your tools?
Is it to make life harder for any would-be burglars? They probably would not spend much time trying to pry open a locked box and they're generally not driving anything big enough to accommodate a decent sized toolbox.

If you do lock it, where do you keep the key(s)?

 

[HanShotFirst]

I learned long ago...place 4 in 1 screwdrivers all over the house in strategic places. For home use the 4 in 1 (or 6 in 1 ) are just the greatest invention ever. Even the cheap ones are pretty darned decent for a simple screwdriver, and those 4 heads fit 99% of what you'll need around the house. Leave a hammer in the house, and another one always sitting on the bench; again, expendible hammers. Also leave a decent, but not expensive set of pliers in plain view. Do that, and my tool box will never be bothered.

The only one who gets into my tool box are my son and I, and there's no problem there.

 

[3 Gun Shooter]

Yes, my ex took a metal finishing hammer out of my metal working box to drive in finishing nails to hang stuff on. Fucked up a $100 hammer.

I bought her, her own tool box with a small claw and ball peen hammer, plus pliers, screwdrivers and adjustable wrench.

 

[3jakes]

If you do lock it, where do you keep the key(s)?

Do you need my address?

I don't lock my box, cause I'd rather they just open the drawers & steal instead of using a pry bar to ruin the box.

 

[LXCam]

Why, do you know where I live????

 

[Farmall450]

No I don't. With that being said we try to keep the shop locked overnight.

I also try to remember to lock it over vacations etc but by the time they'd break in they'd have a forklift and a skidsteer to load it with. Or a torch/drills to open it.

 

[JimH]

Only when I was going thru the divorce and she was still in the house...

But I also changed the locks on the shop, so she never really got to the box.

 

[The Tool Tyrant]

I lock everything (thinking burglary) at both my home garage boxes and my shop boxes and cabinets. I figure, with the burglar alarm blaring and the strobe lights driving them crazy, they're not going to be trying to break into locked boxes...they're going to grab whatever's easy and get the hell out'a Dodge. And I ain't telling YOU where I hide my keys!

 

[vavet]

Do you need my address?

I don't lock my box, cause I'd rather they just open the drawers & steal instead of using a pry bar to ruin the box.

I see how that came across and it's amusing in hindsight.

I guess what I should've asked is if you kept the key hidden nearby so you could access it easily? Is it typicall kept in your bedroom in your underwear drawer? Do you keep the only copy of it on your person at all times?

 

[EdH1]

My garage is well secured. Doors reinforced and locks top grade. I do leave out tools that are cheap for anyone who does break in to grab. My best tools are in cabinets and drawers that do not look like cabinets and drawers and these are secured as well but not with visible locks.
The exception are tools I store in my big craftsman tool chest. My wife bought the chest as a birthday present for me back in 84. But the wheels are off.
When I have to replace a power tool, I keep the old tool for display so that s---heads can grab them easily.
My garage also looks like a big mess and that's deliberate. To me it looks like heaven.

 

[Richard Cranium]

none of my tool boxes are locked, I have a torch in the garage and don't want them to cut them open. As for the keys they are in the left top drawer of the tool box.

 

[Fedwrench]

Every tool box is locked, along with all of the built in cabinets.

 

[unslow1]

None of my boxes are locked. The garage has an alarm and cameras because of a previous break in.

 

[cliftonbros89]

I lock up mine. I keep my truck boxes locked up and keep the keys in the truck. My shop boxes on the farm all stayed locked up too. One reason being so no one uses my stuff. My dad and brother-in-law are the only ones who know where the keys are and are all allowed to use my stuff. One of my uncles also lives near the shop and his son-in-law has been arrested multiple times for theft so I don’t take any chances.


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[jchetty]

My toolboxes are locked. One key is locked in the other box. The box key is attached to my house keys. My spare keys are in a safe.

The boxes are blocked in by a pickup truck. Garage is always locked, has internet, and has video cams that email me on movement. I will be adding Simplisafe. I live in a very safe & quiet neighborhood with awesome police 2 blocks away.

Why the paranoia? Have you ever had a car broken into at a parking lot? Yes..oh okay. How many have had a car broken into and only the driver + passenger seat stolen? And no....the police would not let me driver home sitting on top of a milk crate. Man I wish I recorded the call to the police.

 

[grumpychevy]

Detached garage so everything gets locked including the vehicles inside. Things are pretty tight in there so actually stealing either of my toolboxes would be nearly impossible unless you moved a vehicle out of the way first, and even then they would have to load a 1500+ pound loaded box on a trailer. I understand “where there’s a will there’s a way” but why make it any easier on someone with malicious intent. If they destroy the box to get the contents, then so be it. I have insurance, but there’s that slight chance that they’ll feel getting into a locked box may make too much noise or take to long and decide it’s not worth the gamble of getting caught because of it. As for the keys, they are not kept in the garage.

 

[TheEuronater]

My elderly neighbor is lonely and recently started bringing super shady girls around. Im not sure if theyre tweakers or not but they look like it so everything stays locked.

 

[EdH1]

Quote from JCHETTY...""Why the paranoia?"" I was a cop for 30 years, 18 on the street going to House B&E's etc. I looked at a few dozen workshop B&E's.....I also interrupted a B&E at a neighbors garage about 2 months ago.
Many of the B&E's were quick, break in and grab stuff and get out. So I leave cheap/broken out stuff for them to grab because if and when they are caught our Courts are going to regard them as property offences and just slap wrists. Police probably will not recover the tools, especially if they are good tools.

 

[canuckian]

Yes. For all reasons listed except keeping the wife out. She knows her way around a toolbox and indirectly and directly helped pay for some of its contents so she can have at it.
Keys are on my key ring and spares are kept in a very safe place.

 

[66HertzClone]

I have not locked mine in the past, did when we were out of town. However, I'm at a point where I may start locking them up, my son has taken up one of my wife's worst habits, not putting something back after it has been used. He has her other bad habits, never shutting off a light when they leave a room.

I've gone to get a screwdriver and find sometimes several missing, pretty easy to tell when you have all of them in racks in the drawer. Pliers also seem to disappear, I am missing some tweezers, scissors and every one of the 6" scales that I had. No one remembers using them but they are gone, maybe I should make a need list for my Christmas stocking.

 

[Ji m]

.

Why the paranoia? Have you ever had a car broken into at a parking lot? Yes..oh okay. How many have had a car broken into and only the driver + passenger seat stolen? And no....the police would not let me driver home sitting on top of a milk crate. Man I wish I recorded the call to the police.

We were working in a sketchy part of town and I got to hear the story from the guy who came out to find his car missing one of the back doors!

Stolen in broad daylight while parked on the street.

Of course he was carpooling with 3 other guys, and got pulled over by the cops on the way home for driving without the door.

 

[Mustang1167]

Yes. I used to live with my brother and he would steal things all the time. The paranoia never went away. Plus I’m not a trusting person. Locks keep good guys honest.

 

[dimichele]

Locked. I also lock up larger items: welders, saws..... with chain or cable, to make it hard on thieves.

 

[ItsNemo]

Nobody in the house touches or wants to touch my tools, so I'm the only one accessing them. Locking the box is not going to stop the thief from using whatever they did to get in the door in the first place from prying open the box, therefore, no point in locking it up.

 

[thooks]

Heck, many times we find we’ve left the front door unlocked for who knows how long

 

[toolenthusiast]

My elderly neighbor is lonely and recently started bringing super shady girls around.

I don't know why I can't stop laughing at this

 

[chrisnazzy]

My box is always locked unless I'm in the garage with it.

My wife and my girls know where the keys are and are welcome to use any of my tools whenever the need arises.

My box weighs nearly 700lbs empty. Never weighed it loaded but obviously heavy AF.

A wise Snap-on dealer once told me "I don't want to meet the guy who could make off with my box. However if a would be thief found it unattended and unlocked even for a few minutes, they could easily swipe thousands of dollars worth of my tools in a duffel bag!"

Chris.

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[bobcatdan]

I don't lock my box at work let alone the boxes at home. I don't even lock the house or shop unless I go somewhere over night.

 

[bcradio]

No way. Would take way too long to unlock every time I need to get a tool out.

 

[Jtels85]

Always keep mine locked up. If someone wants in them that bad, they’ll get into them. At least by locking them... they’ll have to work for it.

 

[anndel]

I do. I trust my wife as she's good with tools as her dad was a mechanic and plumber. I don't trust strangers and the homeless that wander around our neighborhood breaking and entering and stealing. The homeless was even caught stealing our water from our garden hose.

 

[apollo11]

I'm not telling

 

[IMStuner]

Yes when I leave my gun in there.


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[Empty Pockets]

When I leave my shop, the shop is locked. The property is protected by and my 100 pound dog. If someone was to get in, the building is alarmed and all boxes and cabinets are locked.

The keys to the building and cabinets are in 3 places, my key ring, my wife's key ring and my #2 son's key ring. In the event wife or son need a tool, they are not allowed to return it to my box. I have a large plastic box on my work bench. They place the tool in the plastic box.

This system works for me.

 

[mudflap]

none of my tool boxes are locked, I have a torch in the garage and don't want them to cut them open. As for the keys they are in the left top drawer of the tool box.

The "Break in" mugshots/suspects on the News around here look like people that would probably blow their selves up before they got the torch lit and adjusted to cut anything.

 

[Semi-hole mechanic]

I used to when I was married just to keep the ex out of my tools because she didn't put them back. My current GF and her daughter are pretty goo about putting things back.

 

[dr_clyde]

I only lock jobsite boxes. My boxes at home and at the plant are always unless they are being moved.

 

[Rileysan]

Do you need my address?

I don't lock my box, cause I'd rather they just open the drawers & steal instead of using a pry bar to ruin the box.

Totally agree with this. My family knows to not get into my tool boxes and if someone broke into the house, they're going to get into my tool boxes locked or not. They're perfectly ok being unlocked

Brian

 

[kumquat]

Lock it at home? Surely you jest. The best time for my son or son-in-law to come and use my lift or whatever to fix their cars is when I'm not here (I may offer too much "advice").

 

[jhelrey]

Locked to keep people out of it in case the garage door were to be left open, etc. Where the handle goes, it's bolted to the build in work bench so you'd really have to fight to get it out. Then I keep pry bars and sledge under lock and key to prevent them from being used. If I go on vacation, I park my truck tight against the box/bench to prevent easy access.