You just reminded me about this. My iphone has notified me that someone else's airtag has been traveling with me. It even shows the path it (and I) took on a map.

A gal I know told me yesterday that one of her sons owned a bike that was stolen. He had an air tag on it. Told the police where to look for it but the police said they do not bother looking for bikes. So, he went into a very nasty part of town to try to find it, found it in a pile of garbage. She did not say if it was worth finding at that point or not.

I do not know if this is worth doing or not, but I have registered my bikes with Bike Index.
https://bikeindex.org

They used to sell Bike Index stickers that did not have the scannable code, I put one of those on each of my bikes. Thus I am hoping if one of my bikes is stolen that the police look up the brand and serial number.

Now they only sell stickers with a scannable code, should make recovery even easier for the police.
https://bikeindex.myshopify.com/prod...dex-qr-sticker

I was planning a bike trip to the UK a few years ago, did not go. But if I went, I planned to register my bike with this organization.
https://www.bikeregister.com/advice/how-it-works

I just bought one. Thank you. It occurred to me that I could build that for myself, but the price is low enough that they are saving me trouble. As with other safety devices, you can never tell if this succeeded at preventing theft, but you can find out that it failed to prevent it. I'm OK with that.

When I was a kid, my dads bike was stolen. A few months later the Minneapolis police called him to say they had his bike. At that time, Minneapolis had a bike licensing program.

In my community (Madison WI) they used to have a bike licensing program, I registered each of my bikes for the license, but never bothered to renew the license, once I had the sticker on my bike I assumed that would be adequate. My thinking was that if one of my bikes was stolen, that if the police in a nearby community found it, they would contact Madison to ask who owned the bike with XXXXX registration number. It worked for my dad.

But, about four years ago Madison canceled the bike registration program, they suggested residents sign up for Bike Index or Project 529. I chose Bike Index at that time.

A few years ago a friend of mine said that his daughters bike was stolen, she lived in a different state. She saw her bike on Craigs list a few days later, called the police, the police asked if she had proof that it was her bike. And she said - no. Police said - sorry. And that was it, she did not get her bike back.

I just checked Bike Index, it lists all my bikes as registered in June 2021, plus most of my bikes also have the expired Madison license sticker on them. And looking at my list of bikes on Bike Index, that reminded me that I never posted a photo for each bike, which I should do.

They used to sell these stickers, but now they appear to only sell the ones with a scannable graphic. I bought ten. Only have two left.

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...0b18140226.jpg

tracker comparison
 

I have the tile, It's not the best but it works for android. They have a card that fits in wallet really well but if you sit it sometimes presses the find button sending a msg to phone to ring until found lol.

Not android compatible (yet) but I have a Knog Scout on my bikes. https://us.knog.com/products/scout

you can mount it under a water bottle cage. Pretty discreet. Basically like an AirTag but you can set it to alarm if your bike is moved.

Nice that it’s rechargeable! I hate burning thru the coin batteries..

What device of yours uses coin batteries rapidly? Most that I have use the energy sparingly. The one exception is my spoke lights.

I just use airtags! But even at every 9-12 months, I just hate throwing a physical object away. The rechargables are very attractive! I'd guess if one wanted to really "close the loop" you could try charging off a dynamo hub but that seems.. potentially. silly and expensive.

Charging off a dynamo hub requires proper circuitry. It's worth it only in a few cases such as when you're going on a long tour where you will be away from an electrical outlet. Are there rechargeable cells compatible with CR2032 cells? CR2032 cells are normally 3V whereas most rechargeable stuff lately is 3.4V. That may not matter for airtags but I don't know.

https://www.bikeforums.net/touring/1...xperiment.html

Different topic, days or maybe weeks ago we discussed stickers for Bike Index. One other sticker you can consider in event of theft is a decal with your last name on it. I have bought decals on Ebay for a few bucks. Most recently from this seller, three inches long, I used Michland font. Fits nice on a toptube on one side. My last name on the decal is nine characters.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/387272378522
Probably adjust length for number of characters. A thief that wants to keep a bike will try to scrape off the decal but a thief that only wanted it for a free ride or that plans to resell it the next day might not think to bother.

If you are trying to charge up a small device, do it at home on a charger.

I use a dynohub for battery charging on bike tours. My last three bike tours (each was multi-week) I was 100 percent self reliant for electrical needs from the dynohub.

Even though I have the equipment for it, I would not try to use a dynohub to charge a small anti-theft device.

Now someone has thought about a way to hide airtags. I hope more come out. I might attach this bell to my bike with security screws.

LINK


https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d342698b3d.jpg

That looks like a neat idea if that sort of bell works for one's bike.

A lot of bells are sized for flat bar size handlebars. I have made some bells with metal brackets fit on my drop bars because I could bend the metal and buy longer screws.

Do you have drop bars? Will it fit?

It looks like a neat idea, but only if it fits.

This says 22.2mm.
https://www.amazon.com/LESOVI-Bicycl...dp/B0D77B633H/

Also, is the bell dome brass? If it's not, I won't use it, now that I've learned of the magic of brass bells. But maybe I could replace the dome. Oy, how many more unfinished projects do I need?

I have several bells without brass bells, work fine. One started out with a brass colored coating on it, now a decade later the accumulated sunlight has destroyed that coating layer so now it looks silver. And the plated steel parts were so rusty that I took it apart and sprayed the steel parts (which is everything except the bell part) black. Still works great. This one started out sized for a 22.2mm bar, I bent the steel to make it accommodate a 31.8mm bar, which meant needing to buy longer M4 screws.

Photo is six years old, before I sprayed the steel parts black. I have very similar bells on four or five bikes, a couple are red. Now the plated nut on top was rusty too, painted it with black nail polish.

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...1f292abd0e.jpg

But you can't hide an Air Tag in that bell.

Yes, they work fine, but I don't like them as much. It's probably for the same reason they make trumpets, french horns, etc out of brass. It's just a nicer sound, and it resonates for longer. It's just my preference, but thanks, because what you said is worth saying.

Sorry for being off topic. For some reason when you referred to brass musical instruments, this immediately came to mind.
https://www.npr.org/2024/01/03/12227...-has-been-reis

Last summer on a trip to Italy we took our tandem separated and packed into two boxes. We attached Airtags to each frame section. Leaving Dulles one of the boxes didn't appear to move from the main terminal while checking the Airtag status. The other box was on the plane as reported by the Airtag. I was miserable thinking that we would start our trip with only half a tandem arriving in Rome with us to begin our trip. Alas, upon arrival in Rome, both boxes appeared at baggage pickup. Both Airtags worked and reported their locations on the return trip home so there was some sort of glitch on the outbound journey. In the end, all was well, but Airtags are not perfect.

Many people are way too optimistic about how well these work.

The current AirTags have limited range and sensitive to placement so there are times they drop off the grid for periods of time. I’ve had similar instances, however you can quickly tell by when the last time the tag was located. This is only the first generation of this product, and I’m sure improvements will be substantial. Compared to any other product on the market. This technology has been extremely helpful and reassuring.

I have one of those airtag bells, not bad. I originally got a water bottle bracket but the way my bars are it was a PITA to undo if you needed to replace the battery or make it soundless so I ditched the bottle bracket for the bell.
I did notice a difference with the airtag, which would make sense though. I had been storing my bike in our garage, 2 story wood & cement building with siding, no issies with tracking the tag (I get bored sitting in doctors offices, so sue me LOL) but when I put it in one of those steel storage boxes (think major company advertising them for moving) the tag completely & totally dropped of the grid, even if I was standing outside the box less than 5 ft away.
That makes sense though that the steel box was cutting the tiny little BT signal so no complaints from me.

I have hacked a couple of them to make them silent though, wasnt too hard for someone as clumsy as I can be, just watch the YT videos on it & take your time. And yeah, they can be tracked through the bell, probably would work better if I was in a city, but I'm not. Least its less likely for my bike to be stolen though, heheh.