The cylinder holds the secret, the lock holds the mechanism
The cylinder is the part the key goes into. One screw on the faceplate and it comes out, with nothing else touched. That is what gets changed when a tenant leaves one of the Puisoz studios, when a house on avenue de la République changes hands, or when a keyring disappears during a walk in the parc de Parilly. We note the model, the backset and the centres before discussing parts.
The lock itself is another thing entirely: the case, the bolts, the linkage of a multipoint, the faceplate on the edge of the leaf. You go there when the mechanism gives up — a bolt that no longer throws, a linkage bent out of true on a plateau door that has been forced for months, a faceplate pulling out of an old timber leaf in the bourg.
The diagnosis happens at the door. A key that has been catching since winter does not tell the same story on a new leaf at Grand Parilly and on an original door in a Minguettes block still waiting for its refurbishment. The itemised quote is presented before the work, line by line.
What the door dictates, before the catalogue does
In the vieux bourg nothing is standardised. Thick leaves, short backsets, rim locks screwed on in the nineteen-sixties over joinery far older than that: the survey is done on site, and a stock part sometimes will not fit without work on the frame or the keep. A bourg door gets measured, not ordered from a reference number.
On the plateau two realities sit side by side, occasionally in the same street. The rebuilt stairwells at Vénissy received new flat doors with shrouded multipoints, their linkage hidden behind a cover; the cages not yet renovated keep original locks whose spare parts are no longer made. The replacement is not remotely the same job.
If your home belongs to a landlord, as it does in a large share of the Minguettes stairwells, the flat door key often opens the hall, the cellar or the bike store as well. The replacement has to preserve that: it goes through the landlord or the managing agent, never through a cylinder bought at random. Tell them in writing first. A master-key scheme broken by accident leaves a tenant stuck outside the bin store.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our lock and cylinder replacement page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Vénissieux.