cyclezealot

Just wondering the conditions upon which your bike was stolen.. Do minimal locks protect your bike in normal conditions..Guess, your might need a more secure lock in high crime areas? Would you trust your bike out of sight with just a reinforced chain and lets say - a pad lock... Do we all need kryptonite locks to feel secure... I rarely secure my wheelset when the bike is secured..Maybe I should.
When stolen were you at home or in a public place..what was stolen , etc.

jefft

I got an older bike lifted from my shed about a week ago. I'm in London Ontario which is a university city so it's fairly bad, but nobody had ever entered my shed before.

The good news was that I saw some drunk university student riding it a couple days ago and after a polite yanking it back home, locked away.

BostonFixed

Left it in the front yard overnight, no lock. No bike in the morning.

jeff-o

Stolen from an open garage. No lock. At least three people in the house, though.

We got it back though, some punk at the local middleschool had taken it.

I suppose this doesn't help determine what locks work, eh?

monogodo

Parked at friend's uncle's house a block from school w/ no lock. Bike was stolen when I had to stay after school in detention because I was late that morning (because I was looking for my bike lock, which I didn't find until I got home that night). We recovered the rear wheel from a kid who bought it from the thief. The kid ratted out the thief, who was ordered to pay restitution, but never did. I also never got the bike back.

ajay677

I had a bike stolen off my lighted front porch. It was locked with a Kryptonite cable lock that the thief cut with bolt cutters. All I was left with was the cut lock and the crappy bolt cutters the punk thief dropped in my bushes and couldn't find in the dark.

way124

Twice my bikes were stolen, I thought they were locked. No trace of cut cables. So maybe I didn't actually lock them...

rule

Stolen out of my garage. Was not secured. Oh well....

EnigManiac

Toronto has been the bike-theft capital of North America for more than thirty years so it's something we're all familiar with here. I've had probably 6 or 7 bikes stolen over the years and each time I had only locked it up with a single chain lock (my own fault), but all were outside my house or place of work. I usually (and now very adamantly) use a minimum of three locks (1 cable, 1 thick chain and a U-lock) but my bikes now are far too attractive, unusual and rare for me to be irresponsible with them. Of course, those qualities also make them unattractive to thieves.

operator

You mean qualities that make them attractive...?

roadfix

In Japan, about 35 years ago..... Bike was not secured at a bowling alley. Except for this one instance, there was no reason to secure bicyles.....millions of others didn't.

Simplebiker

Mine was stolen in front of the office building where I worked at the time. I usually locked it to the rack with a U-lock, but I do remember one time before it was stolen when I absent mindedly forgot to lock it. The day it was stolen, I probably had forgotten again. There was no sign of a broken lock anywhere and the lock was mounted to the bike when not locking the bike.

I'm at a different office building now and I pay 50/yr for the bike lockers. I prefer a U-lock to a cable lock when I'm going to leave my bike out of sight around the city. I went to the library one day and locked my bike with a cable lock. When I came out, a couple of guys were eyeing my bike. There were a few other bikes there. All had U-locks. I guess mine looked like the easiest one to steal. And of course, the best deterrent is to make it the hardest one to steal.

flyingCoyote

1. dept store mountain bike in hallway of 8-unit bldg in working class Brooklyn neighborhood - cheap cable lock holding it to radiator in hallway cut.

2. put-together-from-junk bike stolen outside bodega ("deli", "general store") in nice bklyn neighborhood- unlocked

3. Giant iguana with Kryptonite u-lock - lock cut while I was in a bar in Greenwich village seeing a show

4. 1-week-old mongoose rockadile - secured to parking meter with huge chain and lock (Kryptonite). Chain through frame and front wheel, around meter post. Nothing left an hour later on busy street full of cops(!). Realized that if you quick-released the front wheel there might be enough slack to slip the whole thing over the meter's head.

Laggard

Left it in my garage unlocked for two years. Decided to lock it up. Next day it was gone.
Cable cut.

But seriously, never had one stolen.

recursive

Wasn't locked, but my bike was once stolen from my living room.

canuckbiker

One time I had one snatched from my back yard. It happened before I cared about maintaining my bike, and it was in pathetic condition. I almost felt sorry for the person who took it.

krazyderek

my dad's old old road bike was stolen from our back yard when i was like 11, no lock, just hanging on a fence. Brakes didn't work at all so the theif probably got in an accident making away with it, poor guy.

Left my bike outside leaning against my car all night in the driveway once, not even a finger print on it, but it was a ugly old bike with a rear wheel rack.

biodiesel

two bikes,
one locked to a short street post (they stole the sign and lifted the bike and lock over the top!)
one, unlocked in front of the library. (should have seen that one coming)

Lost three locks though. (why not three bikes?)
CROSS LOCKING.
Always use two locks. Period.
Have had combo's left lying open, a cable lock smashed, a cable mangled and cut. Always the second lock unnoticed/ untouched.

My best pair is a mini-ulock and a short combo cable.

jasony0423

Nope, but it's only one day old, though. Did have my car stolen once, though.

zebano

Had a 3 key combo (0-9;0-9;0-9) when I was 12 with an attached chain... I was playing baseball and after the game the lock was open and the bike was gone.

More humorously, in college I lent my keys to my roommate who promptly lost them... I couldn't ride for 2 days. I ended up renting some bolt cutters and having to prove to the campus police that it was indeed my bike. They then told me they would have cut the lock for me at no cost. I got my keys back 2 weeks later ...

Daijoubu

Went to buy a stamp inside a convenience store (in the day), came back 40 secs after and it was gone
I did check if there was no one in my sight too

Bontrager

When I was little I had at GT Pro Performer "freestyle" bike (the ones you do tricks on). My buddy's dad had an engraver so one day we all decided to engrave our names on the bottom of the bottom bracket.

A few months later my bike gets stolen from my front yard (no locks, we were little). About a week later, I see some dirtbag/burnout in front of the food store with what looks like my frame. I tell my mom that I think that's my bike's frame. We go over to to dirtbag and tell him that's my frame. I flip the bike over and what do you know? We get the supermarket security guard, he calls the police. Cop calls his parents, takes the bike and drives it over to my house where the dirtbag takes his components off and puts mine on with the cop watching.

It was freaking hilarious.

cyclezealot

For me..It is out of sight ..It is locked...No matter how short a time...

LV2TNDM

Luckily for me my only bike stolen was a Peugeot mountain bike from 1984. Had it locked outside of the Chemistry building at UC Berkeley with what I thoght was a big, thick, secure cable. Well, it was big and thick, but not secure! I took the remaining piece of cable home and tried to cut it myself - it took about 30 seconds with a hacksaw.
Happily the bike was returned to me. Three years later a neighboring city police dept. called me to say they recovered my bike! Some kid was riding down the wrong side of the street at night with no lights. Cops pulled him over and did the usual checks. When they ran the serial # through the computer, bingo! So the lesson in this is to be sure to record your serial # and keep it in a safe place. Better yet, engrave or stamp your drivers license # on the frame. And if you ever have a bike stolen, be sure to report it. Yes, the police have lots on thier plates, and bikes oftentimes become low priority, but theft of nice ones qualifies as grand theft, so they'll act if they have the opportunity and right information.
I now lock with u locks or a New York chain. Whenever using a u lock, I be sure to remove the front wheel and run the U through both wheels and frame, filling up the inside of the U to reduce the ability to get tools on the lock. Mini U locks work great for quick runs into the store.

Noif666

That's a fantastic story!
Personally I haven't had a bike stolen (knock on wood), I only use a cable lock and usually only put it through the frame and front wheel because it doesn't have the length to go through both. If I'm with a friend we use 2 locks and put the bikes top to tail, putting the locks through the front and back wheels and frames at either end (attaching them to a bike rack/ sign post/ etc).
After some of these stories though I think I'm going to go and get a U-lock of some description!