Bham bike theft?

A friend recently got his biked nicked from an indoor 'CCTV-ed' car park in the middle of town. It was only locked with a combination lock but it got me thinking is bike theft a worry or on the rise in bham?

What are peoples view on bham bike theft? Has anyone had anything nicked?

Will talking about it promote bad karma??....

Of course it's a worry; it's a worry anywhere you go in the world. Bikes have been nicked from next to my bike on various occasions. They were a lot cheaper than my bike, but the owners were using cable locks. You can snip through them in one easy snip with a cheap, easily concealable tool. Why bother using them? You might as well leave it unlocked.

Use a very good shackle lock in addition to a cable (or two shackles if possible), try to lock up where a thief would be quite exposed (i.e. not surrounded by crowds of people) and try not to leave your bike for too long. If possible put it somewhere you can see it.

If possible take your bike into wherever you're going, or lock it where it can't easily be reached (I've locked mine to the top of railings outside a pub before)

In Birmingham I regularly see £2000 bikes with £1 cable locks, sometimes these cables are barely thicker than a brake cable.

But they never get pinched.

I think the lack of cycling culture in the city means people dont hold too great a value for bikes. Most thief types in Birmingham would much prefer to mug you for cash & phone rather than end up with a bike they cannot sell. Average street thugs cant really tell what a valuable bike looks like.

On the other hand there a select bunch of drug addicts who do steal bikes, but again they know little about value. They are opportunists and would steal anything really.

I had a bike stolen from outside aston uni Guild and saw the thief cutting my lock in the distance!

It was a very scraggy looking junkie with a pair of small boltcutters. The bike was a simple mtb commuter I built that'd be worth £120 to the right people but didnt look it.

I found it 2 weeks later at the city boot sale, put an extra lock around it and waited for the perp to come back. Turned out the guy had innocently bought it the week prior at the same sale for £15, he showed me and the market police the seller who was a bric & brac stall who bought it in turn from the junkie. Meaning he mustve sold it for like £5

All was retrieved and everyone sorted out.

But it just goes to show you the mindset of birmingham bike thieves. They know fuck all about bikes, are usually a confused desperate smackhead who will have no idea where to shift the bike once they stole it.

Very few theives in Birmingham would have the patience to cut a shackle lock, even a very cheap one.

I reckon the majority of bike thieving occurs with kids robbing each other, at least thats the way it was when I was a wee lad in this brummie town.

yeah, i don't think it's a huge problem. in nearly a year nobody has come into the shop trying to sell anything suspicious. although i do hear quite frequently from bike-theft victims. almost all of them were using cable locks. toronto is awful for it, so i reckon it's down to the volume of bikes on the streets, the quality of locks people are using, the market for "used' (ie stolen) bikes and the amount of drug addicts looking for a quick theft and sale.

although i don't think it's that bad in birmingham, i still can't bring myself to spend much money on my fixed bike because i'd just worry about locking it up, which i do quite often.

There's a few fella's knockin' around town that like a tickle now and then. I had my Stumpjumper nicked from outside CycleSurgery last year, and I've had one or two "run-ins" with some local scallies.
I've not been here long enough to know if it's bad or not, but i have no time for thieves. I just wanna smash 'em up. I have no tolerance.

what was your stumpjumper locked with?

I personally dont think its a big problem in this city, though I have been a little getting paranoid lately...i use a shackle lock, think my bike will be fine with that.

There's a few fella's knockin' around town that like a tickle now and then. I had my Stumpjumper nicked from outside CycleSurgery last year, and I've had one or two "run-ins" with some local scallies.
I've not been here long enough to know if it's bad or not, but i have no time for thieves. I just wanna smash 'em up. I have no tolerance.

New York Fahgettaboudit®
The big 'ol chain...
Whoever pinched it left the chain on the ground as a big "fuck you"..... i came back to the bike with the wheel in my hand and just felt gutted...
On the plus - I don't have a full susser anymore. Just a fixed love affair now mate.

New York Fahgettaboudit®
The big 'ol chain...
Whoever pinched it left the chain on the ground as a big "fuck you"..... i came back to the bike with the wheel in my hand and just felt gutted...
On the plus - I don't have a full susser anymore. Just a fixed love affair now mate.

Thats insane!

Big chains are croppable with really big bolt cutters. But its only usually pro thieves that go to such lengths, those which I dont think we have in Birmingham.

But I know there are quite a lot of thieves targetting scooters & motorcycles, who drive around with vans and lots of gear. Mustve been someone like that.

was talking to a security guard at uni the other day , and he said that quite a few bikes get nicked on campus, but only the ones with the really thin locks. I guess it just cos there's quite a lot of bikes around, and students don't really want to pay out on locks......I wonder what happens to the bikes?

I've never had anything stolen in the seven years or so that I've been commuting to the city but then no one wants a dirty blue singlespeed anyway, nor a dirtier peugeot conversion....
They seem to want either brand names or toys r us full sus bikes.....

They seem to want either brand names or toys r us full sus bikes.....

I think that was a big thing which cut down theft/desirability of bikes to thuggish yoots'

A decade ago anything with suspension was gold, something with disc brakes unfathomable to a city teenager. These kind of mountain bikes were worth thousands of pounds and a rare sight on the street. Having something that unusual was a real status symbol. So rough kids would happily attempt mugging someone for it, and theyd find a buyer pretty quick.

Now, you every budget halfrauds/toysrus/sterlinghouse £60 mtn has full suspension and often disc brakes too.

Most of these kids or older thieves arent 'cyclists' they dont have eye for quality. To them these bikes look the same. So desirability for a shiny springy bike has died pretty much.

I remember parts of the city I couldnt go near on my bodged £60 bmx, people would come running and surround me with fists & knives if I came close.

Now I can roll around on a DH rig in the roughest areas/parks of the city and no one bats an eyelid. Theyd be more keen if you had a mini-moto.

I wonder what happens to the bikes?

Either ridden or sold I'd guess...

I'd encourage us all to post our bikes up so that we can look out for each other....

Saw one of the local 'youths' on a high spec custom bmx in sparkbrook, stratford road.

It was unstickered plain black frame, odyssey stem, super wider bars, brakeless. One coloured rim (anodised proper rim I think, hard to tell colour in the dark)

The whole bike was spotless, looked like a fresh build practically, it was very doubtful it belonged to the kid riding it as he struggled to get up a kerb and could barely ride the damn thing. I expect it was pinched off one off the kids en route to creation skatepark.

I was wondering what skatepark you meant for a few seconds there, until it clicked. It'll always be Epic to me. Why did they have to change it to such a daft-sounding name, eh?

Because Keith who ran epic (although a nice guy) was financially inept, ended up trying to squeeze funds out through arts grants, club nights etc - all which went horribly wrong. So he left the oh so lucrative skatepark industry and I think he is a pub landlord now.

The Creation Climbing centre which was already using half of the space inside logically took over the skatepark side, logically it adopted their name.

Saw one of the local 'youths' on a high spec custom bmx in sparkbrook, stratford road.

It was unstickered plain black frame, odyssey stem, super wider bars, brakeless. One coloured rim (anodised proper rim I think, hard to tell colour in the dark)

The whole bike was spotless, looked like a fresh build practically, it was very doubtful it belonged to the kid riding it as he struggled to get up a kerb and could barely ride the damn thing. I expect it was pinched off one off the kids en route to creation skatepark.

it could have easily been his bike. unless you knew of or were witness to this bike being stolen, i dont see why this was posted here. dont judge the mudge man....(i couldnt think of anything that rhymed with judge that meant dude).

I grew up in that area, I can spot a stolen bike a mile off.

I grew up in that area, I can spot a stolen bike a mile off.

so did I. but its highly judgemental of you to assume its been stolen. because its sparkbrook does that mean nice bikes arent allowed? and therefore it obviously must have been stolen off a more privileged kid down the road in moseley??

im done ranting but my point is, I dont know the truth and neither do you.

i suppose another possibility is that one of his parents/ relatives is loaded and bought it him because all the other kids have got them.

although if you're a bmxer its easy to tell a 'proper bmxer's bike' from a bog standard off-the-shelf bmx, so it does arouse suspicion when you see someone who's clearly not a 'proper bmxer' riding one.