No keys..what to do.

I bought a car from my next door neighbor. Know them my whole life. The car was his grandparents. The car has been in storage in my neighborhood since it was new. (He lives on grandparents property, 3 generations) But the keys are gone, probably when they tore the house down.
1. Car is junk, but want to get it running. What tricks with the wiring/column? Dont want to ruin the column

2. How can i access the trunk? Inside thru the back seat?

Car ir a 73 New Yorker.

I'm assuming the ign/doors/trunk take the same key (???). what I would do is pull the back seat & pay your skinniest friend to climb thru into the trunk with a pair of pliers & pull the flat clip so you can remove the lock cyl out from the outside & take it in & have it keyed. if anything about that wont work then you will have to pull the steering wheel then the lock cyl in the column & same deal have it keyed. You could call a locksmith to come over & do it (all) on site but it would cost a bit. EDIT WITH more thought you might roll a front window up & pull the door panel & pull that same flat clip to get the cyl out

you can pop out a door lock and take it to a lock smith. they should be able to cut a key for 20 bucks.

if you must hot wire, to start it, I would just do it under the hood and back feed power inside instead of trying to hot wire it under the column.

and yes pull the back seat out and you can tape a screw driver to the end of a broom stick. or if you have a small kid they can crawl through the opening and pop it from inside with a screw driver.

Ignition key is different from the trunk key. I was curious what was in the trunk so i removed the rear seat, undid the spare and crawled back in there and popped it open with a screwdriver in an area that looked like a screwdriver was supposed to go in there. It worked. Bumper ruiner (jack) looks brand new lol. No stashed cash hoard tho.

How can i hotwire it? The car will go to the crusher once its parted, i guess the locksmith will be ok if hotwiring is a pain to do.

just to get it to run, jump a positive lead from the battery to the input side of the ballast. then bridge the starter relay and it should turn over and try to fire.
It should run like that just fine.

BUT in 73 I think you have an interlock in the column where you can't put it in gear till the key is turned. you will have to defeat that if you want to shift gears.
Then it might be easier to find the instructions on popping out the switch.
then you can start it without the key at all.

Forgot about the shift deal. The door locks are the same as the ignition right? If so, ill take the door lock to locksmith.

Popping the ignition isn't that hard (is it a tilt wheel? Then its a bit more involved).

As others have said, take a door lock to the locksmith.

To hotwire it, it really comes down to just three wires on the column. I did it on a wrecked '73 Satellite I had. It's been too long to remember the specific colors, but, it's RUN START and POWER. I spliced the run and power together, then touched the start to the power. To turn it 'off' was just a matter of removing the power from the run.

But, doing it this way, you still need to unlock the column. If not anything else, you can hear it run this way.

Oh, and hot wiring it at the column keeps the neutral safety switch in play, so if its in gear, it will not start.

EDIT: I was about to post a pic of how I hot wired that Satellite, but then thought, do I really want to show the world?

how ya gonna steer it with the wheel locked?

If you wish to save some money, you could pull the tumblers out of the ignition and door locks. Then you could use any key.

LOL reminds me of time I went on 2 day 13mile hike with a buddy, parked my truck at the end of trail took his car to the start of trail. I figured I'd put my keys under his seat so I did not loose them hiking......oops how am I going to start the truck when were done,,, took some wire and ran a hot lead from bat to coil and jumped out the starter relay ,,, one good yank on the wheel and the steering lock was no longer an issue...I had pulled the pins out of the door locks years before so a dime would open the doors...

Try to file down an old Mopar ignition key so its smooth.Lots of times on older cars it will work.I have a set of Matco key picks I used at the shop.One for Mopars was almost smooth.It would work great when i forgot the keys for my ram charger.Rocky

if you have some extra cyls for parts & them & the ones you are working with currently have the chrome rectangular covers you can mix/match tumblers/spacers so all of the locks can be opened with the same key even to where one set of keys opens ALL of your vehicles!. the tabs on the chrome covers are brittle so be careful with them. bend em just enough to get the cover off. if you are lacking parts you can have 2 holes operational instead of all 5 (nobody picks locks anymore except in the movies). with the key inserted you mix/match tumblers/spacers so the final height is the same (not too tall not too short) so the cyl can turn.

This. Or remove the cylinders altogether and use a screwdriver. If you're parting it out, why pay more money to have a key made.

If he wants to save the column Like it sounds he does. He will need keys anyway.Rocky

Contact member 6bblgt. He can make keys with the code off the door lock cylinder. See if he is able to do 1973 cars. He did a 1970 for me, saves much work.

Run a wire from the + terminal on the battery to the double blue wire on the ballast to turn on the ignition, then jumper the large threaded terminal on the starter relay to the small yellow wire on the starter relay to engage the starter.

Make sure the shifter is in Park or Neutral.

Back in the day, I had a lock smith make a replacement ignition/door key. He took a blank key, shined it up the top edge that came in contact with the tumblers with steel wool. Put the key in a vice grip and put it in the passenger side door lock. He rocked it back a forth until the tumblers marked the key with their location. He used a triangular file to indent each position. Polished the blank again and repeated the operation. When the tumblers quit scratching the blank, that notch was right. In ten minutes, he had a key that worked. I followed him to his shop and he used the key he made to determine the nearest code for the key, made the code key up and I was set. This was on my 1974 Satellite.
He used the passenger lock because it is the least used. He made a code key as the crude one he made would have unduly wore out the tumblers since it had real rough edges.
I have had success doing this myself to remove the ignition cylinder. Once that was out, replaced the cylinder and door locks.
Craig

This is easy, did it many times back in the day. For the ignition key start by removing the steering wheel. There is a small spring loaded pin you depress to remove the lock cylinder.
For the trunk I used to remove the back seat. You can crawl in or use several long socket extensions and remove the two bolts holding on the latch mech.
Easy to do and no damage done.

In lock talk, that process is called impressioning. I suspect it's a dying art among locksmiths.

You ever seen the original Gone in 60 Seconds where Toby Halicki steals Jill the Challenger??

Screw in Slide hammer into ignition lock.
A couple good pulls and the ignition barrel will pop right out.
Insert Screwdriver into hole and use like a key.

Bob's your uncle.


Also, now that you've got the ignition barrel out, you can either take it somewhere and have keys made, or order a new set of door/trunk/ignition locks and re-key the car like you're going to have to anyway.