Smart locks
House lockouts
Re-keying
Deadbolt upgrades
Schlage
Kwikset
Car keys & fobsNon-destructive entry first, always - and we re-key Schlage, Kwikset, and Baldwin locks on the spot while you watch
You get a price before we start. It does not change when we arrive. No surprises.
Get your free estimateMedeco Locksmith in Los Altos Hills, CA | Cypress Lock & Key
We provide independent Medeco service across Los Altos Hills, from rekeys and master key systems to Car Key Replacement in Los Altos Hills and electronic lock repair. The one thing that makes our Medeco work here different is that we’re used to finding your lock without a visible address. Los Altos Hills has no sidewalks, no streetlights, and no mail delivery to the door, so most calls involve gate codes, private lane names, and long driveways before we even touch a cylinder. Call (877) 265-4385 and we’ll walk you through it.
Why Los Altos Hills Residents Choose Us for Medeco Service
Medeco locks show up on a lot of Los Altos Hills properties because they were spec’d by a security consultant or an architect thirty years ago, and they’re still on the door because they still work. We know these locks the way a mechanic knows a specific engine family. We’ve rebuilt Medeco mortise locks on 1960s ranchers, rekeyed Maxum deadbolts on recent rebuilds, and pulled Medeco in Stanford eCylinders out of gate operators after atmospheric river storms. We’re not a manufacturer shop and we don’t pretend to be. We’re an independent service provider, which means we repair what’s repairable and tell you straight when a cylinder is worn past saving.
Noel Carver runs our Medeco work. He came up through a locksmithing and security systems program at Fresno City College and has been handling high-security cylinders in this part of the Bay Area for going on two decades. He carries OEM pins, springs, and key blanks for Medeco’s M3, M4, and KeyMark lines, because using aftermarket internals on a restricted keyway defeats the entire point of owning a high-security lock. If you’re in Los Altos Hills and your Medeco key sticks, binds, or won’t turn after a storm, you want someone who knows exactly why. That’s what we do. We also handle Medeco sales & service for clients upgrading from builder-grade hardware.
Styles & brands we work with
Common Medeco Locksmith Problems We Solve in Los Altos Hills
- Medeco eCylinder failures after storms. Los Altos Hills sits in the foothills above the valley, and the first big atmospheric river of the season knocks out power to gate operators, call boxes, and electronic locks all over town. When a Medeco eCylinder loses power, it typically fails in a locked state, and the homeowner is standing outside their own gate with no way in. We carry backup batteries and bypass tools for exactly this call.
- Medeco Maxum deadbolts binding after the ground shifts. Saturated ground from winter rains shifts fence posts and gate frames by a few millimeters. That’s enough to misalign a strike plate and make a Maxum deadbolt bind or fail to throw fully. You’ll feel it as resistance in the thumbturn or a deadbolt that only half-extends. We realign the strike or re-shim the gate hardware to get the throw clean again.
- Original Medeco mortise locks on 1950s-70s ranchers. A lot of older Los Altos Hills homes still have the original Medeco mortise locks installed when the house was built. Decades of use wear down the internal springs and pin chambers, so keys stick, the lock feels gritty, or the key won’t insert at all. We can rebuild the mortise body with OEM components, which is usually cheaper than replacing an antique lockset, and far better than putting a Kwikset on a door that had real hardware.
- Restricted keyway wear from lane dust. Private lanes and unpaved driveways in Los Altos Hills generate fine dust that works its way into Medeco cylinders over time. That grit accelerates wear on the restricted keyway and causes intermittent key insertion or turning issues. Periodic cleaning and lubrication helps, but when the keyway itself is worn, we cut new keys to the original code or rekey the cylinder.
- Lost keys on restricted systems. Losing a Medeco M3 or M4 key isn’t like losing a Kwikset key. You can’t run to a big-box store and have a copy cut. We rekey the cylinder and cut new restricted keys to the new code, which also restores key control if you’re concerned about who might have the lost key.
Medeco Service in Los Altos Hills: What Local Conditions Mean for Your Equipment
Here’s the thing most locksmiths don’t tell you about working in Los Altos Hills: the address on your work order is often useless. This town has no mail delivery to the door and almost no visible street addresses from the road. Homes sit behind gates at the end of unmarked private drives. Before we can service a Medeco lock, we have to find it. That means relying on gate codes, call-box directories, and the name of the private lane, not a house number. If your gate box directory hasn’t been updated in years or your lane name isn’t posted, we’ll work with you on the phone to get oriented. This doesn’t happen in Mountain View or Palo Alto, where the house number is on the curb. It’s a Los Altos Hills thing, and it shapes every single service call out here. A Medeco repair in Los Altos tech who’s never worked the hills will burn twenty minutes just finding the right driveway. We don’t.
Medeco Models & Products We Service in Los Altos Hills
We work on Medeco Maxum deadbolts, M3 and M4 high-security cylinders, eCylinder electronic locks, and KeyMark and KeyMark XT cylinders. On a typical Los Altos Hills estate, that might mean a Maxum on the main residence, KeyMark cylinders on the pool house and guest quarters, and an eCylinder on the driveway gate, all keyed to one restricted system. We stock OEM pins, springs, and key blanks locally for fast turnarounds, and we repair before we replace. If a lock body is sound, we rebuild it. If a cylinder is worn past safe operation, we’ll say so plainly and quote a replacement before any work is done.
Medeco Service Pricing in Los Altos Hills
Medeco work costs more than standard Schlage or Kwikset service because the parts are restricted and the labor takes longer. A simple rekey of a Medeco M3 or M4 cylinder in Los Altos Hills typically runs $45 to $90 per cylinder, including new restricted keys. Replacing a worn Medeco mortise cylinder runs $90 to $180. A full Maxum deadbolt replacement lands between $180 and $340 installed. Electronic eCylinder service, including battery replacement and reprogramming, runs $95 to $220 depending on what failed. What drives the cost is the specific hardware in your door and whether the keyway needs to be re-pinned or replaced. We quote the full price on the phone before anyone is dispatched, and that number is the number on the invoice. No call-out surcharge added on arrival. Call (877) 265-4385 for an exact quote on your Medeco system, estimates are free.
Serving Los Altos Hills, CA — Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Los Altos Hills area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage — if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs – Medeco Locksmith in Los Altos Hills
Yes, and honestly this is most of what we do out here. We routinely work from gate codes, call-box directories, and the homeowner’s private lane name rather than a house number. When you call, we’ll ask for whatever access information you have and talk you through getting us to the lock. It’s a normal day in Los Altos Hills for us.
First, check whether the lock has a backup battery or a mechanical key override. Many Medeco eCylinders do. If the override isn’t working or you don’t have the key, don’t force the lock. Power outages in Los Altos Hills often strand homeowners outside their gates, and we respond to these calls throughout the storm season. Call (877) 265-4385 and we’ll talk you through what to check before we dispatch.
Yes. Many estates here have a main residence, guest quarters, pool house, and detached garage, each with its own Medeco hardware. We design and rekey master key systems so you have one key for common areas and restricted keys for everything else. Medeco’s M3 and M4 platforms support this cleanly, and we cut all keys in-house to maintain key control.
Yes, and this is straightforward for us. We disassemble the cylinder, re-pin it to a new restricted key code, cut new keys, and verify the lock throws cleanly. You don’t need to replace a sound Maxum deadbolt just because keys are missing. Rekeying also eliminates the risk of whoever found the old keys using them, because the old key no longer turns anything.
Heavy rain in the Los Altos Hills foothills saturates the ground and shifts fence posts and gate frames slightly. That moves the strike plate a few millimeters, which binds the deadbolt and makes the key hard to turn. It can also push fine dust and grit into the keyway. We realign the strike, clean and lubricate the cylinder, and if the keyway itself is worn, we rekey or replace the cylinder so it operates smoothly again. Call (877) 265-4385 and we’ll diagnose it over the phone first.
Service Areas Near Los Altos Hills
We handle Medeco service throughout the Peninsula and down into the South Bay. If you’re in Los Altos Hills service area neighboring communities, we cover San Mateo and Hillsborough to the north, Larkspur and Mill Valley across the bay, and Martinez to the east. We also run Medeco calls regularly for Medeco service in Mountain View and Medeco service in Green Valley. Same crew, same OEM parts, same straight answers on the phone.
Book Your Medeco Service in Los Altos Hills Today
If your Medeco repair in Loyola lock is sticking, the keyway is worn, or you need a rekey on a restricted system, call (877) 265-4385. We’ll quote the full price on the phone, and if it’s urgent, we can usually get a tech out the same day. Know your hardware, know your options, the rest is just turning a key.
Written by Noel Carver, Owner at Cypress Lock & Key, serving Los Altos Hills since 2004.