relyt

What is the best way to lock a bike to this type of rack?

Picture: https://daviswiki.org/Bicycle_Parking...et=Campus4.jpg

I see those racks a lot, and I'm not sure how one could use a U-lock with them. If the back wheel is placed in the slot, is a U-lock long enough to secure the wheel and frame?

Zinn-X

those types of racks are useless. cable locks can be cut and u locks can only protect one wheel. thus, useless.

maddyfish

You can park you bike straddling the rack and u-lock it to the posts. Additional safety by then cable locking the wheels to the rack. Also if you can lift the rack up and wrap a cable under the main frame of the rack that would be good.

maddyfish

Make sure though the posts are secured to the frame of the rack with some sort of theft deterrent bolts, and not regular bolts, that could just be removed.

supcom

You put your rear wheel into the rack, remove the front wheel and use a U-lock to lock it all together.

Bill Kapaun

I've noticed that a few of that type rack in my town have had the welds broken with no apparent force (bending/scars) placed on them. POOR welds!
These don't have a plate bolted to the angle iron, but have the rod tack welded to it. They look like it wouldn't take too hard of a push to break them.

alanbikehouston

A useless rack. Even if you have two or three excellent locks, the rack itself has a flawed design. The best campus "rack" is the simple "half" hoop, made of beefy steel, set in concrete. Each hoop handles two bikes, yet the hoop itself takes up only a space of about one foot by three feet.

In downtown Austin those hoops are everywhere. In the warehouse district, the old-time sidewalks provide only about five feet of space, but a hoop up against the side of the building works well, yet does not block the sidewalk.

The problem is, the crummy "school" style racks are still being sold by wholesalers, so they are easy for a school to locate and buy. I have NEVER found a company that sells and installs the "half" hoops, although obviously sources must exist. I wish the installers would put their names and phone numbers on the hoops to make it easier to find them.

Boudicca

You got a picture?

Toronto was terribly proud of its post and ring contraptions, until someone realised last year that you could use a 2x4 to force the ring off the post, load ring and bike into a vehicle and skeddadle. Nobody ever proved it happened, but it seemed pretty scary.

And the paint on the rings is really rough, and it scrapes the paint off your bike in no time.

Aaron_F

Just lock it up with more cables and u-locks than the other bikes on the same rack, and maybe they'll skip yours and steal one that takes less effort.

In '98, after I got my first bike and didn't have a clue about anything, I locked my bike to a parking meter for a while and browsed around a LBS. When I came out, I was unlocking the cable and realized anyone with any sense at all could have just lifted the cable over the meter and been gone with it. Now I keep it locked in my hatch.

relyt

Well, I don't know about other places, but half the bikes I see at college are in those racks without any locks at all. I'll just lock up the best I can on one of those, secure in the knowledge that I don't need to be locked up well - only better than the others are.

operator

er, it did happen.

Buglady

Ah, the old "I don't have to outrun the bear, I just have to outrun the other hiker" strategy

(I do the same thing. I lock my bike up next to something shiner and less securely locked. My Raleigh is older than 90% of the student population anyway!)

Boudicca

The city tried like hell to downplay it. Did they ever fix anything?

okra dictum

Anyone got a picture of the Austin bike hoops? It sounds interesting but I can't picture it. Is it just a semicircle of steel set in concrete? What diameter pipe and what is the radius of the pipe circle?

discosaurus

There are a couple of those racks on my campus. I hate them, but when I have to use them, Don't put the wheel in the slot, lean the bike next to it. Lock it to the top loop of the rack with a u-lock through the rear wheel between the stays. Like this. Even if the wheel has a quick-release, it can't be removed from the bike when it's locked like that.

I only trust those locks for quick in-and-out trips. If you have to lock it for more than a few minutes, find a better rack.

Tapeworm21

These racks bug the crap out of me. I don't get why they made this design.



These are the best:

alanbikehouston

That second hoop is what I see in Austin. In the warehouse district (now full of restaurants, clubs, condo's, hotels, and government offices) there is one or two such hoops near every building. I walked eight or ten blocks without ever being more than half a block from a hoop.

Sometimes they are installed with bolts. I feel better when they are actually set in the concrete, which they often are in Austin.

One advantage is that a single hoop can be "snugged" up near the door of a building and it provides parking for one bike without obstruction the sidewald (the bike is parked parallel to the wall, using less than two feet of the sidewalk).

GeoLes

I am not a fan of that type of rack. You may be able to do this with the rear wheel in the slot, but here's an alternative. Rather than place the wheel in the slot, pull up along side the end slot remove the front wheel, and u-lock frame, rear and front wheel together by locking it near the bottom bracket.

operator

Negative. They're just ignoring it, sometimes I almost wish someone would just be a vigilante and break a bunch of those O rings with a 2x4's and leave those at the scene so people would be like

wtf.

rmfnla

+1

Can't understand what all the fuss is about.