Bike fear

edmundane
"GPS your bike" julian? how much capital you got? count me in if you're starting the business but be mindful that i have no money and no technical know how.

There's a company that make a childs watch with a GPS receiver and a GPRS transmitter within. So if you carelessly leave your toddler lying around somewhere, you can check on a website to find out where she went. I reckon that sort of thing could be re-purposed to fit a bike.

I rarely lock my bike up anymore due to ever growing bike theft. there are pros out there that can break this but I carry it to deter the "common" thief when I think I might HAVE TO lock my bike up.

Everyone's digging the mini DLocks... but aren't they the ones that you can open with the barrel of a felt tip pen?

Nah, they've changed the lock system now.

TheBrick(Tommy) http://www.bikeregister.com/

Not free but not bad either can even get an electronic tag installed

Bronze £5.95 (Registration & logbook)
Silver £10.95 (Bronze + Police approved marking)
Gold £20.95 (Silver + Electronic Datatag)

The bikeregister thing is worth doing - Matt and I both have it, they take a description of your bike and your frame number and stuff. The marking is pretty useful, although they told us the 'visible part would wash off once it was dry', which it didn't, so now Matt's seat tube has some blue painted numbers on it (I suppose that is a bit of a deterrent though) - mine's under my down tube so not so visible. I think they show up under UV too or something? It's special paint, they said/

We got ours (Silver option) free from the police on Soho Square - they were doing a little project at the time, so its worth asking your local police if they still run things like that. Perhaps they will surprise us all by giving a sh1t.

Better than a sharp stick in the eye anyhow

I think most police stations do it for free in London. I asked an armed police officer one evening when I was out if they do, he said yeah, any station :)

for the number of bikes i go through, it's not worth tagging em :P

for the gps watch thing you could get one, take your seatpost out, stuff it into your frame, seatpost back in and hey presto.

or take your seat apart, fit it into the padding, re-cover your seat and jobs done.

I need to get a burlier lock, mine looks pretty soft compared to that kryptonite badboy

I've been stopped by the cops for violations - you know, wrong way on a one way, skipping a light etc.- one time I asked the officer why he didn't check my frame number while he was at it. He a) didn't know where he would look to find the number b) didn't know if there was a list of stolen frame numbers c) thought it would be a waste of his time.

Frankly, the cops couldn't care a row of buttons about stolen bikes.

fakenger35
Frankly, the cops couldn't care a row of buttons about stolen bikes.

That's not completely true. I was stopped twice in one morning ghost riding 2 bikes to the Liverpool street station for friends of mine coming in from Holland.

Was the same car as well. I had a lot of explaining to do the second time they stopped me...

as in 2 bikes as well as yours?? or just yours and another bike...

he was riding whilst pushing a single bike with his free hand.

i thought he meant riding no handed with each hand on a bike... quite a feat.