After AAA and their mysterious Fletcher locksmiths wasted half of my precious weekend, I decided to reach out to a local locksmith one evening last week. He met me in a parking lot an hour later and cut the new keys for me.
There is something entirely strange going on with the driver’s side door handle, lock cylinder, or both. For whatever reason, the cylinder doesn’t turn more than half way anymore. I sprayed it down with WD-40 and worked the springs and wafers around, thinking it was just gunked up in there.
I eventually gave up and took a file to it, smoothing down the tiny rough edges of wafers that were sticking up. The old key worked perfectly in this door lock and the ignition. The new key works perfectly in the ignition, but binds up in the door lock. Who knows. I tested the new key in the passenger side door handle and it works perfectly there, so problem solved!
Swapped them over. Officially, I am back to the same key for all three slots, even if only two of them actually work.
