60 • HARDWARE&SECURITY
‘As well as producing locks, 25 years ago
the Guardian factory branched out to
begin producing some of the most high
end doors available on today’s market’
Kazan Kremlin
The following morning, I
decided to treat myself to a prebreakfast tour to see the Kazan
Kremlin and other sites in this
ancient city despite the rain.
Then, after a hearty breakfast I set
off on another long journey – this
time to Yoshkar-Ola. Five years
ago, the Soviet-built central area
of Yoshkar-Ola was bulldozed
to make way for a magnificent
new square. The phenomenal
architecture was stunning with its
beautiful decorative brickwork – if
you do a Google image search,
you’ll see exactly what I mean.
Kazan is surrounded by a
vast forest of pine and silver
birch trees which have grown
to dizzying heights – it really
does make the New Forest look
like a small woodland! To my
surprise and, contrary to western
propaganda, the Russians take
the protection of their wildlife
and the environment very
seriously. I saw signs asking
people not only to be aware of
bears, lynx, elk and other forest
creatures, but also to protect
their environment in order to
guarantee their survival.
After a fabulous lunch in the
new castle-like building I was
off to the Guardian lock factory,
a modern facility that produces
high quality, high security locks
for the Russian market. At the
Mettɜm factory I’d missed out on
viewing the production process as
the workforce have the whole of
July off for their summer holiday.
However, at the Guardian factory
production was in full swing
and, unlike the Chinese lock
factories I’ve visited, it was much
more mechanised. Despite this
mechanisation, the Guardian
factory has a large workforce due
to the sheer scale of operations.
As well as producing locks, 25
years ago the Guardian factory
branched out to begin producing
some of the most high end doors
available on today’s market. The
folks at the Guardian factory take
great pride in the way in which they
produce steel, heavy duty doors
that are substantially insulated
to keep out the cold during the
severe Russian winters. The door
production process is a well-kept
secret and nobody is ever allowed
to visit the factory and view the
production process until an
exception was recently made for the
owner of APECS to visit and view
the production of these high quality
doors.
The lock production side of the
factory is highly mechanised and
equipped with high end machinery
from all over the world – Italy, the
UK, Germany, Switzerland and
Taiwan. The Guardian factory has
also produced its own unique high
tech production machines.
Moreover, the Guardian factory
sports its own timber processing
site in order to ensure top quality
production at all times.
Russian Locks Unravelled
Russian lock standards differ
considerably to those used in the UK.
Russian locks are large – very large
and rely heavily on lever locks that
use a lever mechanism operated by
double-bitted keys which can throw
the bolts four times. The Russian
voluntary GOST Standard is a set
of technical standards maintained
by the Euro-Asian Council for
Standardization, Metrology and
Certification (EASC) and allows the
tester 30 minutes to try to defeat a
lock by picking, drilling and other
forceful attack methods. APECS
always tests locks to this specificatio