Campo and valley
The big old lock on a store among the vines
Vines are the largest crop in the Villena term, and many plots keep a store with a heavy timber door and an old lock to match. When that lock can stay, when it is repaired, and when it has to go.
Vines have long been the main crop of the Villena term: in the most recent agricultural count quoted for the town, they covered 4,185 of its 14,100 cultivated hectares. Olives and almonds share the slopes, and the same crops run through Beneixama, Cañada and Camp de Mirra. Across all that land stand stores: small buildings for tools, a tractor, the harvest or the wine, many with a heavy timber door and a lock as old as the door.
People who inherit or buy one of these plots usually ask the same thing: can the old lock stay?
What these locks usually are
Most are one of three things:
- A box lock screwed to the inside of the door, with a large key and a simple mechanism of a bolt and one or two levers.
- A hasp and padlock added later, often because the original key was lost.
- A mortice lock cut into the door, sometimes with a modern cylinder added by a later owner.
All three can be perfectly serviceable. None of them is high security, but a store in a vineyard is not a bank, and what you need is a door that shuts, locks, and still opens after a winter.
When it can stay
- The key turns, the bolt moves fully, and the door shuts without being forced.
- The screws hold firm in the timber.
- Nothing of value is kept inside that would justify more.
A clean, a dry lubricant (not oil, which thickens in the frost) and tightening the fixings is often all it needs.
When it should be repaired
- The bolt only goes half way: usually the door has dropped, and adjusting the hinges or the keep fixes it.
- The key is worn and catches: the lock can often be cleaned and adjusted.
- The screws have pulled out of soft timber: re-fixed into sound wood.
When it has to go
- The lock body is cracked, or rusted solid inside.
- The only key is lost and the lock cannot reasonably be opened and kept.
- You now keep something in the store worth protecting: tools, a quad, machinery. Then a sturdier lock or a closed-shackle padlock suited to living outdoors is worth the money.
We change and repair the locks on these doors and gates. We do not make or weld doors, gates or bars.
Winter, and long absences
These stores sit through Villena winters with nobody touching them; the town’s record low is −24 °C. A padlock that is not used for months is the one that will not open in spring. Our guide on frost and the lock explains what to try and what to avoid. If the store is out in a pedanía, read directions to a house in a pedanía before you need anyone to find it.