Tourism has been Guardamar’s main business since the 1950s, and a good part of it runs to the summer. If yours is a shop, bar or kiosk that pulls its shutter down in autumn, the first morning in spring has a way of starting with a padlock that will not turn.
What the winter does
Salt. A padlock on a shutter that faces the beach spends months in salty air. Its shackle and its mechanism rust, slowly but surely.
Sand. Fine sand blows off the beach and into the keyway of the padlock and the cylinder of the shop door.
Nothing moving. Locks that are not used do not clear themselves. The grease hardens and the grit stays.
A week before the shutter goes up
Do not wait for opening day. A week before:
- Go and open everything: shutter padlocks, the shutter lock, the shop door, the back door, the office.
- If a padlock is stiff, blow out the keyway with compressed air and use a dry lock lubricant, not oil.
- Turn each key several times and lock and unlock each padlock a few times.
- If anything is still stiff after that, have it seen to now, on a quiet day, rather than on the busiest morning of the year.
On the morning, if it will not open
- Do not hammer the padlock. It rarely works and damages the shutter.
- Do not force the key. A key snapped in a padlock makes the job longer.
- Do not cut it yourself with an angle grinder near a shutter you want to keep.
- Take a photo of the padlock or the lock and send it on WhatsApp. A seized padlock is often freed rather than cut, and if it has to be cut, a new one goes on before you close that night.
New staff for the summer, old keys from last year
Spring is when the team changes. If staff from last summer still have keys, it is a good moment to change the cylinders: see the lock change page. A car locked with the keys inside on the way to work is another story, covered in keys locked in the car at the edge of the pinada, and for the list of everyone who might still have a key, read who else can open your door.