Squire Urban Paramount lock

The Squire Urban Paramount boasts a Sold Secure Gold rating and a 10 year guarantee, so we were expecting a good level of protection, which it certainly delivers. However, our efforts attacking the lock, while we didn't break it, rendered it useless for the next trip: not a good thing.

The Urban Paramount is a good quality U lock with a Boron Steel shackle double locked at both ends into a hardened body with a very decent 6-pin tumbler mechanism. There's a mount included which is functional rather than great, but holds the lock fairly steady.

We attacked the lock with our usual thieves' armoury: 30" bolt croppers, persuader, hacksaw, hammer and cold chisel. All sorts of twisting and banging didn't get the lock to budge but the plastic casing on the body did get pretty wrecked. After the allotted five minutes we gave up and unlocked the unbreached Squire, at which point the the lock simply fell to pieces.

It seems that the internals are held in by the plastic sheath, and when it breaks they slide out: far from ideal, and all it would take to fix the problem would be a plate at both ends of the body.

Verdict

The Squire gave good protection and as such is a very decent lock. However, after an attack you may need to go and buy a new one, as bits that are easy to break are part of the essential structure.