Converting "toy" handcuffs

Postby Harold » Tue May 17, 2011 9:52 am

I was familiar with the old cast metal cuffs (kinda big) where only a sprocket (four pointed star) wheel came in contact with the jaw. After breaking off the safely release lever (induce metal fatigue with needle nose pliers) and using a small drill (Dremel in my case) to grind it down even further it was ready to go. Those cuffs had a "stop switch" like the double-lock on police cuffs which kept the star wheel from moving. As they were being tightened a ratchet lever was pushed out of the way but would block the star wheel from going the other way. Using the key or release lever kept the lever from stopping the star wheel and jaw from backing out. The keyhole was large enough to allow any number of "sharp" objects to pick the lock.

More recently, cuffs from JARU had such a small release lever just breaking it off was good enough. The mechanism was much smaller and there was no Stop Switch. Unfortunately the end of that release lever kept the locking mechanism in place and on one of the cuffs the whole locking mechanism fell out. To le trash can.

My last ones were the "Real Stuff" cuffs from Imperial Toy. Unlike the jaw with slots for the star wheel, this one had the familiar ratchet teeth and a "V" shaped pawl pushed into it. The pawl was hinged at the bottom of the "V" and turning the key would move one side out of the way so the cuff could release. Unlike their version of some eight years ago there was no Stop Switch. I had no problem with the break off and file down of the release lever.

Tried some self bondage this morning. After tying my feet to the bedpost I threaded the cuffs through a combination bicycle lock secured to the middle of the head of the bed. About fifteen minutes before sunrise I was trying to get a pillow out from under my head so I could see and manipulate the bike lock when suddenly (and unexpectedly) I was free. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link and in this case it was the point where the chain goes inside the cuff. These cuffs did not allow this point to rotate and by twisting the cuff and chain someone could add quite a few pound-feet of torque to an escape attempt. Police cuffs all full rotation at this point so the chain can't be twisted and can take 500 pounds of stress.

Re: Converting "toy" handcuffs

Postby ropendope » Thu May 19, 2011 3:27 am

I usually just duct tape up the lever.

Re: Converting "toy" handcuffs

Postby vivian_tied » Fri Jun 15, 2012 5:38 pm

In my experience, the toy cuffs broke very easily