State-of-the-art locking system in the Frauenkirche in Dresden

On 25 October 2005, even before the official opening of the reconstructed Frauenkirche (the "Church of our Lady")  in Dresden, Mr. Eckhart Leptien, Managing Director of CES, symbolically handed over the power of the keys to senior engineer Dipl. Ing. Eberhard Burger, manager and spokesman of the principal, the Frauenkirche Foundation Dresden.  The artistically crafted oversized ceremonial key shows the outline of the baroque church and a silhouette of the ruins that had remained until the reconstruction of Dresden's inner city began.  The official act of handing over the keys is traditionally a responsibility of the manufacturer of the locking system, which in this case was CES in cooperation with Felgner Sicherheitstechnik, Dresden.  During the ceremony, Mr. Leptien said that it had been a particular honour and pleasure for CES to contribute to this colossal reconstruction effort by supplying a locking system tailored to the special needs of this historical building.

By the time of the official consecration on 30 October 2005, all doors of the Frauenkirche – from the large entrance portal to the basement door – had been equipped with CES locking cylinders, based on a tailored security concept developed in cooperation with Felgner Sicherheitstechnik.  The implementation of this security concept with the massive historical rim locks of the Frauenkirche required the development of special extra-long and asymmetric cylinders.  Now the state-of-the-art locking system contributes significantly to the high level of security required for public buildings.

The characteristics of the church, which was rebuilt true to the original based on the plans from 1722, posed special challenges for the making of the cylinders.  The preserved original doors and the doors newly crafted pursuant to old designs were provided with true-to-the-original rim locks and historical fittings.  In terms of locking engineering, also these massive rim locks had meet today's high standards of security.  For this purpose, CES manufactured unique cylinders in various special designs. The longest cylinder has an overall length of 153 mm (27.5 mm inside and 125.5 mm outside) which makes it twice as long as a commercial cylinder for a residential door.

All profile cylinders in the portal doors, the inner doors, the staircases, the access doors to Lower Church (crypt), basement and secondary rooms as well as in the access door to the dome are integrated in the locking system.  This permits assigning specific access authorizations for certain rooms and zones to defined persons or groups.  For instance, the organ player key provides access to the organ gallery and church guides can be authorized to lock and unlock certain areas that are accessible to the public.

Incidentally, the KM type cylinders with trademark protection are a CES specialty because they provide indefinite protection against unauthorized key copies: the cross section of the key shank has the clearly identifiable shape of the registered trademark CES.  This ensures that at no time blanks of these systems can be legally offered in the general market.