What began as an experiment with a heavily customized logo lock became something much stranger. EPIC ETCH is 44 Delta's limited series of collectible locks: each design is made in a run of only 50 numbered customer examples, built around its own visual identity, and retired when the run is gone.

This archive starts with what's coming next and works backward through the series.

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EPIC ETCH Series 3 — Rorschach

2025 · 50 numbered locks · First EPIC ETCH produced in-house by 44 Delta

Rorschach was the point where the series changed.

The recognizable characters and narrative scenes of the first two designs gave way to something more ambiguous: mirrored forms, inkblot-like shapes and creatures that seem to change depending on where you look. The front centers on a hellish symmetrical figure; the back carries a more alien interpretation. Delta symbols, 4s and “44” are worked into the surrounding geometry rather than simply placed on top of it.

There was another, more fundamental change behind Series 3: this was the first EPIC ETCH produced in-house at 44 Delta.

Bringing the Etching In-House

44 Delta began in 2024 focused on 3D-printed locksport tools and didn't own a laser engraver when the first branded locks—and later the first two EPIC ETCH series—were conceived. PACLOCK's engraving service made those early ideas possible.

In late December 2024, 44 Delta acquired its own laser engraving machine. Bringing the process inside meant direct control over artwork placement, quality and production timing, but the bigger change was creative freedom: designs could be tested, adjusted and pushed farther without handing the physical process off to someone else.

That freedom shows in Rorschach. Both sides of the key were etched. One side carries an amorphous ghostly figure; the other is washed in splatter artwork. For the first time, the individual serial number appears on both the lock and its matching key.

Series 3 still followed the original promise—50 numbered customer examples, plus number 0 for the personal collection—but it demonstrated what EPIC ETCH could become when the design and the engraving process lived under the same roof.

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EPIC ETCH Series 2 — Rage Against the Lock

November 2024 · 50 numbered locks · Etched by PACLOCK

Series 2 arrived only about a month after the original, but the tone had already shifted.

Rage Against the Lock took the Defender from Series 1 and caught him in a moment every lockpicker knows: the point where a lock simply refuses to cooperate. The calm, almost heraldic character of the first design gave way to frustration and fury. On the front, the Defender erupts with anger. On the rear, a darker force lurks over his shoulder—the thing feeding on every failed attempt and standing between the picker and the open.

The imagery changed, but the format remained: another 50 individually numbered PACLOCK 90A-PROs, custom artwork across the lock, an etched key, and no second production run once they were gone.

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EPIC ETCH Series 1 — Defenders of the Delta

October 2024 · 50 numbered locks · Etched by PACLOCK

The idea started with a simple question: how far could the familiar locksport “logo lock” be pushed?

Rather than placing a logo on a lock and calling it finished, Series 1 treated the entire PACLOCK 90A-PRO as a canvas. The front introduced the Defender of the Delta, standing with his guidon and the 44 Delta marks around him. The rear became an elaborate crest populated by the Defender and his agents. Even the key received its own etched artwork.

More importantly, Series 1 established the rules that would define EPIC ETCH: 50 customer locks, individually numbered from 1 through 50, with each design retired permanently after the run. A number 0 was also created for eschlenz's personal collection.

The result was less “branded padlock” and more a small collectible art object that happened to contain a very pickable lock. That experiment became EPIC ETCH.