new u-lock or locking skewers
 

Currently, I have a Kryptonite chain lock and a small Sunlite u-lock. Due to its size, the u-lock is only capable of going around the back wheel and seat tube, relegating the chain lock to the front wheel, fork, and the object that the bike is being attached to.

However, I learned a while back that the rear wheel is more valuable than the front. I would much rather use the chain on the rear wheel.

This leads to the question at hand. Would it be safer to get a larger u-lock to use in the front so that I may use the chain lock in the back, or get locking skewers and forgo locking the front all together.

Actually, it a 3rd option just dawned on me. If I were to get locking skewers, I could still forgo locking the front and still get a larger u-lock for the back. That way I would only have to carry a u-lock instead of an 8 lbs chain. Just a thought.

Any suggestions? I am in NYC and will be commuting to a mostly public college campus, if that matters.

With antilock skewers you actually do not even need to lock your wheels and can concentrate on just locking your frame. The kind by Pitlock is viewed as the best, followed by Pinhead.

If you are in an area where bike theft is rampant, as is the case in many college campuses, then you might also want an anti-theft headset lock, and an anti-theft saddle lock as well. The saddle lock is recommended if you have something like a nice Brooks on your bike.

Is it possible for you to take the front wheel with you?

Here is a site to show how to properly lock up a bike with a larger U-bolt: http://www.missinglink.org/page/how-lock-bike Then you can use the chain as added protection to the U-bolt to lock the same stuff the same way the U-Bolt is locked.

But keep in mind that any lock can be defeated, and if you are locking it up in a rough neighborhood or over night with very little pedestrian traffic then you may want another option. If the bike is a high value bike then I would consider buying a cheap "beater" for around $150 or so and lock that up instead, and keep your nice bike for weekend rides. There are battery powered angle grinders that will cut through either a U-bolt or a chain lock in less then a minute each. Lock picking is slowly catching on too here in America, it's stealthy, makes no noise, and it just looks like someone having trouble with their key.

And those lock theft warranties are mostly a joke. To get the warranty to pay you first you have to have police report, some cities like NYC won't come out to do a report for a "lousy" bike. Then you have to have detailed photos of the crime scene including general area, lighting, foot traffic, the undisturbed lock, and what you locked it to. Next you need your original purchase receipt of the bike and a recent (less then 12 months, some say 6 month) appraisal of the bike. Then you need the original receipt and box including UPC code of the lock. Then you need the original damaged lock, if it got taken in the heist your screwed. You send all that in and they determine if you meant the criteria for properly locking up your bike, fail any one of those items you get nothing. I haven't yet on any forum I've ever been on heard of a person who had their bike stolen collect the insurance money the lock provisions had...not saying it's never happened, just saying I haven't seen one yet. Even your homeowners or renters policy will have stipulations too, but not as severe, you will need a police report, and original receipt of bike but not a recent appraisal, pics are nice but not needed, and lock receipts to show you at least attempted to lock it up, which is another reason to show crime scene pics to prove you locked it. Then you have to deal with your deductible. Some insurance companies offer floater coverage for bicycles that will cover your bike for anything happening to including accidents, and no deductible, but I think those are a rip off. They charge $75 to $150 per bike per year, so if your bike remains unstolen for 10 years or more you paid out a lot of money.

I'm not sure what kind of security your campus has but campus's use to have high bike theft problems because of the shear number of bikes and the likely hood of finding a nice bike to steal.

This is what I do. I also have the Pitlock set with the locking headset cap and seatpost bolt.

I don't leave my bikes outside overnight, and I don't live in a high crime area, so my techniques may not work for you but...

I don't use quick release skewers, I use a tire on my commute bike that gets flats so seldom that I don't worry about it. I then use (depending on bike) a small U lock which I use in the Sheldon Brown Lock Strategy, or a frame lock with or without a chain.

The Sheldon Brown method is flawed, if you follow his method all a thief has to do is cut the rim and tire and the bike is gone; here is a video showing just what would happen if you lock it Sheldons way: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9fLtdZyX-A

The way I showed above in an earlier post is the best way, here's that site again: http://www.missinglink.org/page/how-lock-bike

+1 for the missing link I always post the same link for locking up your bicycle and if and when I need to lock up by bike I always use this.:)

What's weird is that ever since U-Bolt locks came on the market the proper way to lock a bike was originally the method shown at: http://www.missinglink.org/page/how-lock-bike and LBS's use to even sell plastic fork dropout caps you put on the ends of the forks to protect them from getting scratched on the bottom. I guess those caps didn't sell well so the company that made them went out of business, so in that process of the caps disappearing alternative ways to lock up a bike with a U-Bolt came a long, and one of the ways is the way that Sheldon shows EXCEPT they locked the rear stay as well. I'm not sure how Sheldon came up with his method because for most part he was always right on when it came to bicycles, but a lot of people did his way because he was Sheldon after all. I guess people didn't think someone would hack the rim and take the rest of the bike, but people did, though for most people doing it Sheldons way is fine because they don't live in high enough crime areas that someone would steal a bike unless it simply wasn't even locked up. Where I live there's been a bike sitting propped up against a business sign right beside a busy street for the last two or three days not locked and so far it's still there!!

I'd like to hear from someone that used the Sheldon Brown method and actually had a bike stolen - evidence please.

What we do at a major big 10 university on an urban campus is the U lock using the sheldon brown method, pinlocks (there are several brand out there) and for areas where there is concern one of the short 4' cables. We put the lock in the back wheel and if required, the cable around the front wheel (or between classes, rely on the pinlocks). Replacing a front wheel is cheaper than a rear wheel and easier. That said, never had anything stolen on any of our bikes using this method - and we are riding better bikes than others on the rack.

Pinlocks work pretty well.

A bike locked with a rear lock and pinlocks is not going to be the easiest bike on the rack to steal by a long stretch. In our case, outside of residence halls are secured pretty well and that has been fine.

I would not leave any bike locked up outside at night unless it's in a secured area.

J.

what are pinlocks?

Here's what we have.

http://www.amazon.com/Pinhead-Bicycl...7562226&sr=1-2

You can also get them at REI.

These are branded as Pitlocks and, while not having used this brand, they look pretty good and probably better:
http://www.urbanbiketech.com/

I might be inclined to get these instead since the machining looks so nice.

Either way, they both make it pretty hard to steal a wheel or a seat. Downside is you have to carry the key with you to change a flat.

J.

The downside of leaving the house is that I have to carry a key to get back in. I have to carry keys to get into work too. And for my U-lock. So carrying the Pitlock key (which they call a "pit") is no big deal. I got a clevis pin for $1.19 at the hardware store. I put the pit on the clevis pin and thread the clevis pin on to my keyring.

Seems like a good time to run through all the security skewer options. From cheapest to most expensive:

• Nashbar Bolt-On Skewers are inexpensive and at least makes a thief find a 5mm. $15 per set regular price, $10 when on sale. I use them on my bikes that will only be locked for a few minutes while I run errands.
• Delta Hublox use a special wrench you can keep on your keyring. $30 list price. Downside: All sets use the same wrench.
• Pinhead Skewers also have a special wrench for your keyring, but have many (an unknown quantity) of different wrenches. They also make locking seatpost bolts and headset caps. In addition to selling under their own brand, they private-label for others. On-Guard and Trek locking skewers are made by Pinhead. Prices vary by set and brand.
• Pitlocks have 256 different special wrenches (which they call pits). They also make locking seatpost bolts, headset caps, V-brake bolts and disk-brake bolts. Sets are available keyed-alike, special-order. (I have three that use the same key and include skewers, seatpost bolt and headset cap.) Available in the US at Peter White Cycles and the US & Canada at Urban Bike Tech.

We have digital locks on our home. no key required. ;)

Thanks for listing all the choices. Of those, I'd pony up the extra coin and get the Pitlocks. We got a set of the Pinheads because we needed them in a hurry but I think the Pitlocks are the best of them (and look the coolest).

J.

The question is whether you think your bike is going to be cannibalized by the parts thieves or not.

I live in Manhattan, and I use a thick kryptonite cable and a planet bike u-lock during the day. The u-lock is enough of a PITA to open even with the key, that I'm OK with that. If I'm headed someplace a wee-bit sketchy, I'll bring two u-locks. If I'm headed someplace very sketchy, I take the subway.

The really nice thing about locks is that they are a visual deterrent. If I had a set of pitlocks (funny .... I was looking at them on Peter White's website today), I would still lock everything up.

In NYC, this wouldn't work for long:http://www.missinglink.org/page/how-lock-bike
The main reason is that it looks like someone has already started to take apart the bike. This says to others, "Abandoned bike." You'd come back and be missing your bars and brakes.

Just a quick correction: Pinheads don't all use the same wrench. I'm trying to find out exactly how many combinations they have (I know it's not as many as Pitlocks' 256, but I think I remember it being somewhere in the dozens), but at least anecdotally I can tell you that my friends and I don't have the same combinations, so when we go on rides we all need to have our keys.

I can't find it, but I saw it earlier today. I believe the Pinhead stuff has more combinations - like 11,000 compared to the 256 of the pitlocks. But either are more than adequate. No thief is going to take the time to try 256 keys that the had to spend days and hours scamming out of the pitlock people and spending a lot of money to do that at $15/key (not to mention the huge red flag when someone calls in and wants one of each key). So, it does't matter really.

The problem with the Pinheads is that you can grab them with a vise grip and turn the head to release it and it's relatively easy to do. You can't do that with the pitlocks - they have an antitheft rotating piece around the head - it's a more robust mechanism (and more expensive). If I had it to do over again, I'd do the pitlocks - I was in a hurry for locking skewers so I ran over to REI and picked up the pinheads and solved my problem. They are way better than QR skewers and only a tiny percentage of bikes ever have even bolt on skewers so they represent another order of magnitude of a problem for a thief AND yet another tool they would need to carry.

So, if you are starting anew with this, get the pitlocks.

J.

Thanks for the information. I've made the correction.

The downside is indeed you need to carry the key with you at all times. It could also get interesting if by chance you ever lost the key.

Thank you got the wealth of info. Any recommendations on a specific U-lock?

The best are the Krypto's, New York if you want the toughest, or the Evolution if you want to save a little money and don't need the extra security.

The upside of having your Pinhead key with you at all times is that you have a bottle opener with you at all times :D

Most of these companies have key registration just like Kryptonite. Lose your key, send them an email with your code, and $10-$20 later you'll have a new key. Sucks in a jam, yes, but getting a wheel stolen also sucks in a jam, right? And like an earlier poster mentioned, you have to have your house keys on you anyway, so now I have a bottle opener on my keychain and can get drunk at the drop of a hat ;)

Pitlock says they don't recommend their product with horizontal dropouts like on my Surly Cross Check.

What about the other products?

I'll have to measure and see if there's a Pitlock that will work with the extra long skewer on my Old Man Mountain front rack.

My current locking strategy is to lock the front wheel and frame to a stationary object with a U-lock. The rear wheel is secured with a ring lock, and sometimes I add a cable to go around an anchor, through the frame, and hook into the ring lock. Without the cable, the ring lock is really just an annoyance to a thief, but the rear wheel in such a pain to remove that even the ring lock is probably overkill. Currently the clearance is so tight at the rear axle that I have to unbolt either my rack or my fender stay in order to get the wrench around the axle nut. That alone deters me from removing the wheel unless absolutely necessary, so I figure it would also be a deterrent for a potential thief. But, even so, the pain of losing my rear, IGH wheel would be considerably more than losing my front wheel, so I still would like to use the U-lock at the rear wheel if I could secure the front wheel another way.

I used to do the remove-the-front-wheel thing, but I do not want to go back to that. Especially now that I have a generator hub that would have to be disconnected every time.

People do and can lose keys, it's great to know you can send your code by e-mail and get your key...problem with that is if ou lost your keys and you have a flat now you're going to wait 2 weeks or so to get the key so you can fix your flat. What's the chance of that happening? Probably slim, but it could happen.

Pinhead does not make the same claim about horizontal dropouts, so I think they are compatible. At least I've never heard differently.