Sea damp, with no wind to dry it
The climate here is mild and the air stays heavy. With no mistral to dry the façades, a timber leaf in the old town moves all year: it swells in winter, settles in summer, and the keep ends up a few millimetres out of line. You then have to lift the door to get it locked at all.
Along the seafront, from the quai Bonaparte to the promenade du Soleil and on to the beach at Carnolès, the spray does the work. Salt settles in the barrel, dust sticks to it, and a cylinder facing due south seizes long before its neighbour in a courtyard. Furnished lets in Carnolès, busy all summer and shut all winter, show that wear even when the lock itself is recent.
The Garavan villas closed for part of the year get both at once. A lock that has not turned for six months, in a damp shaded garden, resists the first key of the season. The instinct is to force it, and that is precisely what must not be done.
Set the door right before blaming the mechanism
The diagnosis starts with the play of the leaf in its frame, not with the lock. Dropped hinges, a frame that has moved in a sloping wall, a keep to reset: replacing the mechanism without correcting that hands the same strain to a new lock, which will wear out just as fast. On the tiny landings of the old town the adjustment is made with the door open, so the way through has to be cleared first.
Then come the familiar symptoms. A key turning with no resistance is the driver. A limp handle is the spindle or the return spring. A top point on a multipoint lock that no longer engages is the linkage out of adjustment, common in the nineteen-seventies blocks of the Val de Menton where the doors are tall.
Two things to avoid. Never force a key that resists: it snaps clean inside the barrel and the extraction becomes a job in its own right. And do not flood the lock with general-purpose penetrating oil: the greasy film catches the salt and dust of the seafront, and turns light fouling into a complete blockage.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our locksmith repairs page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Menton.