Blopslee

Sorry if this is stupid - Until now I've been riding a road bike with Pitlock skewers which I think are pretty high security. I just got a fixie and can't help but wondering if people out there have had wheels unbolted and taken from a bike that is locked up?

It is hard to believe that there aren't people out there who just carry a small adjustable wrench or something - it'd be so quick and easy. Will people really just leave us alone?

Thanks

kemmer

Depends on where you live, I've left my bike locked up in downtown salt lake overnight with both (QR!) wheels unsecured and they were still there in the morning. I've left the bike locked up overnight with a super wimpy cable lock many times. It's an old ghetto SS conversion Giant Butte so that's probably a big part of it, but I'm sure in some places it would have been stolen 10 times by now.

queerpunk

just lock yr wheels. why risk it? i have a QR front wheel so i can take it off and lock both wheels and the frame, EVERY TIME.

zippered

a few years ago someone stole my rear wheel off a low-end hybrid that i'd left for a couple days buried in a snowbank in front of my apartment. seriously, it was probably worth no more than a couple dollars, if that. i was surprised they (restraining myself from making crack-head remarks) even managed to take the bolt off, but it still left me without a ride for awhile. it did give me the excuse to buy my current main ride though...

wearegetgetgo

i've had both of my wheels stolen! left it outside for 10 minutes outside of a burrito place. bummed out.

666pack

i know people who carry around crescent wrenches for this purpose.
lock 'em up. all the time.
never trust anyone, cause people are a$$holes in general.

Rugen

Yep. I replaced some QR skewers with the allen wrench deals. That didn't stop anybody.

Gone in broad daylight.

I Ulock the rear wheel to the frame and the front wheel gets a cable to the frame.

coelcanth

wot ?
you know some bike thieves ?

666pack

yes. i know lots of humans with individual problems. i've never stolen a bike or anything off someone else's bike, but i know people who have, and who i am to tell them they're wrong.
does that make me a bad person?

simple solution: take care of your stuff, never trust anyone to not ***** up your day and you'll be fine.

kemmer

I don't know if it makes you a bad person or not. Personally I wouldn't associate with someone who stole bikes and you better believe I would tell them they were wrong for doing it. I agree with your solution though.

666pack

you can only tell people something so many times, you think i havn't tried? i don't think he routinely steals bike, or has ever even stolen a complete bike. but if some dumbass leaves their schitt locked up irresponsibly i don't feel bad if he's got a new wheel.

stuff's not fair. don't trust anyone but yourself, be careful and you're fine.

gargiulo.mike

i'd feel bad.

chip thunder

That's pretty seriously not ok. I might not whip that ass, but I'd surely let them know how unacceptable that behavior is and would not associate with them. If I had a habit of slapping your mother would you just write it off if you told me you didn't like it and I didn't care and kept on anyway?

666pack

i don't see how your comparison makes any sense.
slapping my mother is one thing, this kid (who i rarely see anyway) stealing a wheel when the owner doesn't even care about it enough to keep it safe is another thing entirely. i always u-lock and cable lock my bike, no matter how long i'm leaving it unattended or where i'm leaving it unattended. i even lock my bike to my bed frame in my house so no one can get it.

do you think i havn't told him it's a ****** bag thing to do? i have. more times than i can recount, and it hasn't stopped him. don't get mad at me, just do as i do and LOCK your schit up. i was merely illustrating that, believe it or not, the world is not fair. people are asses, and your stuff isn't safe unless you're gaurding it.

just don't be a *****ing idiot and you probably won't get your stuff jacked.

wroomwroomoops

See, that part makes you a villain. You condone crime in "some cases". Similar to people who say that a woman "had it coming" when she is *****, if she was walking in a bad neighborhood.

Would you say it's OK to steal your furniture, if you have not locked your door well enough? "Irresponsibly", to cite you?

666pack

ok yes, i am a villain. lock your bikes up when i'm around, in fact that won't do anything i'll probably just jump all over it for fun. for real dude, what up with that?

Rugen

I don't think anybody's calling you a thief. I think there's just some astonishment that you don't give the guy an involuntary colonoscopy with his wrench.

I totally agree that the we all should be taking the necessary precautions to secure our gear. Because people do suck. But sometimes they suck because we let them. Heck, I wouldn't ask him to stop, I'd give him a free dental exam with my u-lock.

I think to the casual cyclist, the assumption is that if it's bolted to the damned bike, they shouldn't have to lock it separately, in a civil society. That type of apathetic, amoral approach with those "people" who jack crap is why we have to lock our bikes to begin with. People do need to live in the real world and keep their crap in check, but when a bike is stolen, locked or not, IT'S THE THIEF'S FAULT. PERIOD. You can call someone naive for creating an opportunity for the thief, but the theft itself is the only true wrong here.

All that griping aside, I still lock both wheels. But thankfully I don't chose to associate with scum that jack people's livelihoods.

666pack

i'm sorry here bro, but that's not how i live my life. if he wants to screw people over he'll get screwed over. it sucks but stuff has a way of travelling around and biting people in the ass.

i'm sorry i'm a nice guy and i prefer to let people make their own choices. call me a terrorists.

queerpunk

actually, most rapes are done by aquaintences, not by scarey criminals lurking in the shadows.

wroomwroomoops

Be as it may, it has no bearing to the analogy I made.

I saw a documentary just a few days ago, about women from mexican villages, often ending being ***** and killed, and they cought one of these serial killers. The guy wehemently denied the charges, but as the interviewer asked what he thought about the victims, he said that he is sure some of them had it coming, for the way they were dressing or the place they were walking. I am of the opnion that people should be free to walk wherever they feel, without having to fear of being killed.

Similarly, I think that one should be free to just have their bikes left alone, regardless of the kind of lock, or even if they are not locked. That bike belongs to someone, you have no ****ing business touching it, let alone taking parts off of it.

Terror_in_pink

i had my wheels stolen like two years ago? I had a chain tensioner on the rear too. Left it outside for 15 minutes. I usually have a chain and a mini and lock both wheels and frame but that day i only had a mini.

I recovered them a day later.

People who steal bicycles are scumbags.

Rugen

How? Did you find them at a shop or something?

tacks

sorry to continue with the hijack topic of this thread: associating with theives

the last time I went to new york I stayed with a friend who lives in this huge brownstone in brooklyn with 9 other kids.
I was messing with my bike in their living room one night and one of the roommates walks in and starts talking to me about how she's thinking of going up to one of the many private colleges in small towns in the northeast and stealing a bike because rich parents will buy really REALLY nice bikes for their kids when they send them off to college and the dumb kids leave them outside to rust locked only with cables. to low parking meters. in alleyways. or some other incomprehensibly dumb move.

her thought was, you know most of those bikes are never being ridden and even if the 20 year old owner did use it, they could easily get another one from their parents.

I choose my friends based on their character and a person's willingness to steal from another person certainly says something about their character, but still. I DO understand where this paticular girl was coming from although I would never take her angle.

Terror_in_pink

check pm

Telix

I have had QR skewers on both my previous bikes, but they weren't anything special. My Mavics clearly look nice, though, so I always lock through the rear wheel and the frame when I secure it. I really should run a cable through the front wheel, too, even though it's nutted.