Viewing 40 posts - 41 through 80 (of 90 total)
  • Aargh. Lost keys to D-Lock. WWSTWD?
  • Sandwich
    Full Member

    I reckon you could get through that lock with a strongly worded email

    Ooh, cutting!

    squirrelking
    Free Member

    Not brilliant for outside use though, the lock isn’t as corrosion resistant as it probably ought to be…

    Ah, good to know!

    doris5000
    Full Member

    I just found my spare D lock key in a box of audio cables. So if you’ve got a similar box, could try looking there?

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    ransos
    Free Member

    When browsing the middle of Lidl, I noticed they were selling battery angle grinders for £20.

    footflaps
    Full Member

    On the subject of D-locks, came across this photo on the local stolen bikes FB page…

    Amazed the lock held….

    [url=https://flic.kr/p/2oDEG4s]D-lock twist[/url] by Ben Freeman, on Flickr

    jambourgie
    Free Member

    On the subject of security, how secure are cable locks? I’ve been using a kind of heavy duty one for years out and about because I can wrap it round my waist like a belt. Just wondering how good they are. It’s for ‘nipping into shops’ duties rather than leaving it locked up somewhere.

    Like this but prob about 18mm

    n0b0dy0ftheg0at
    Free Member

    8/9 years ago I popped down to the precinct to do a quick food shop in Sainsburys, locking up a cheap (albeit decent looking for its age due to lack of use by better half) Saracen Zena2 MTB with one of those freebie Center Parcs locks. It was market day, so loads of people around, should be fine… Less than two minutes in the aisles and a member of staff comes up to me to say a teenage scroute cycled up, took out a pair of cutters and snipped the cable like it was paper.

    If I pop down the preceinct these days on a bike, the Abus (Granite X?) “gold” lock gets used, if I pop to the garage I’ll risk another CP cable lock.

    jambourgie
    Free Member

    Huh, thought as much. Guess I’ve just been lucky.

    binners
    Full Member

    On the subject of security, how secure are cable locks

    You might as well tie it up with a piece of string

    You can get through most of them with some fruity language and a withering stare

    jambourgie
    Free Member

    😁

    binners
    Full Member

    Binnerette number 2 is out and about on her bike quite a bit and for when she has to leave it locked up I’ve got her One of these

    Much better than a cable lock and doesn’t weigh the same as a car

    moimoifan
    Free Member

    Cable locks will only deter the most opportunistic thief. They’re perfect to whip through with sharpened bolt cutters because you can easily position them in the jaws.

    Ever since Aldi and Lidl have started knocking out battery grinders for £20-£25, in particular, it has to be as much about being smart as having the best lock.

    And you can actually buy, kosher, bolt croppers with folding handles! Perfect for concealment, because obviously legit users of bolt croppers often need to conceal them, right?

    Crazy.

    Northwind
    Full Member

    jambourgie
    Free Member

    On the subject of security, how secure are cable locks?

    Security at my work had 2 tools for cutting bike locks- a grinder, and a pair of really good scissors, which dealt with most cable locks.

    Cougar
    Full Member

    And you can actually buy, kosher, bolt croppers with folding handles! Perfect for concealment, because obviously legit users of bolt croppers often need to conceal them, right?

    But you can’t carry a penknife which you can use safely without risk of it snapping on your fingers.

    It’s well out of my area of expertise but I think in a fight I’d rather ‘go equipped’ with the bolt crops.

    moimoifan
    Free Member

    ^^^

    I hadn’t really thought of the relative merits of them for lamping someone.

    It just defies logic that anyone bolt cropping legitimately would want them concealed – except perhaps police. Bailiffs need to advertise their presence and someone just cropping a padlock because they’ve lost their key wouldn’t walk up to their own padlock with the croppers tucked into a jacket.

    TiRed
    Full Member

    I use the same Kryptonite. I think one of the benefits is that if you do have to angle grind them, you need two cuts as the shackle won’t rotate to remove with just one cut. I also use a lassoo cable that has to pass through the front two wheels of the trike and back to the D lock. But most of the time I never leave a bike – work excepted as it’s highly secure.

    politecameraaction
    Free Member

    Ooh, cutting!

    I thought it was a very abrasive comment. I mean, the shear rudeness of it.

    Northwind
    Full Member

    moimoifan
    Free Member

    And you can actually buy, kosher, bolt croppers with folding handles! Perfect for concealment, because obviously legit users of bolt croppers often need to conceal them, right?

    Yeah but they’re not for concealment, that’s just a side effect- they fold up for the same reason just about everything else folks up, to make them easier to carry and store.

    dyna-ti
    Full Member

    If its a replacement you’re after I can recommend the Abus Bordo granit Xplus 6500

    U locks are good, but if a pole or something you want to lock it to is really wide, you cant. At least the folding type fits round just about everything.
    Im thinking of buying another, the alarmed version if I ever have to lock it in the city center, just for that extra bit of security.

    CountZero
    Full Member

    There’s always the option of one of these:

    ernielynch
    Full Member

    Replacing the lock with another one of similar quality is probably the best option imo, in case the OP loses the keys again.

    The gap between locking your bike in the garage and wanting to access it can be many days, which can make finding keys that you might have mislaid particularly difficult.

    Edit: I would expect a thief who breaks into a garage and is tooled up to overcome a lower quality lock to also be able to deal with a higher quality lock.

    jamj1974
    Full Member

    Obviously, I’m not a bike thief but bottle-jacks work well with several locks.

    nedrapier
    Full Member

    Boring fire safety point: clear combustible stuff away from the spark spray if you’re angle grinding in your garage, and go back at intervals afterwards for an hour afterwards to check nothing’s smouldering/smoking underneath your washing machine or in a box of pads and bikepacking nylon.

    Wrecking a frame trying to get your bike free from a lock is one thing, burning your garage/house down is a level up.

    Northwind
    Full Member

    ernielynch
    Full Member

    Edit: I would expect a thief who breaks into a garage and is tooled up to overcome a lower quality lock to also be able to deal with a higher quality lock.

    Not actually the case- basically, the generallevel of bike security is so low that a lot of thieves won’t bother with heavier duty tools, they’ll just move on and find an easier to nick bike. The majority of bike thieves when caught have only relatively basic tools, even now. (there’s probably a self selection thing there, good thieves with good kit are probably less likely to get caught, but it still proves the point).

    That’d change, no doubt, if most people had good locks but so many people don’t lock their bikes at all, and so many that do use crap locks (either because they settled for crap, or because they were sold crap but thought it was good because it was expensive and had all the bullshit certificates like sold secure gold etc).

    squirrelking
    Free Member

    The majority of bike thieves when caught have only relatively basic tools, even now. (there’s probably a self selection thing there, good thieves with good kit are probably less likely to get caught, but it still proves the point).

    Also expensive tools tend not to be something you want to potentially be throwing away in a hurry.

    ton
    Full Member
    ernielynch
    Full Member

    they’ll just move on and find an easier to nick bike.

    Even after they have gone through all the trouble of breaking into someone’s garage?

    I can certainly see how a high security lock would put an opportunist thief off but I’m not so sure about a determined one.

    The reason the OP resolved the lost key issue relatively easily without having to resort to buying specialist tools is because of the lock’s relative low quality.

    Alarming the garage perhaps and using fairly low quality locks sounds more useful than using locks which prove almost impossible to cut.

    footflaps
    Full Member

    Cable locks will only deter the most opportunistic thief. They’re perfect to whip through with sharpened bolt cutters because you can easily position them in the jaws.

    Was walking to lunch the other day just in time to watch some scroat steal a moped cropping the cable lock in the train station car park. He’d obviously bypassed the ignition first. Owner had a D-lock but had just used it to join the two ends of the cable lock together. All that was left was the D-lock and two bits of cable lock on the ground. Very brazen theft, surrounded by people, he didn’t GAS who saw him steal it and nearly knocked over a couple riding off on it…

    mert
    Free Member

    Even after they have gone through all the trouble of breaking into someone’s garage?

    99% of garages can be broken into, pretty much silently, in a handful of seconds.
    Even ones with “heightened security” don’t take long.

    Cougar
    Full Member

    Very brazen theft

    Out for a run one time, down the canal towpath. This dodgy-looking bloke stops me, “hey mate, is there anyone in that boat over there?”

    I’ve no idea, sorry.

    “Right. Only, I’m going to rob it.”

    ernielynch
    Full Member

    in a handful of seconds.

    I make that 5 seconds!

    squirrelking
    Free Member

    Yup, that’s about right for an up and over with a shitty cable lock.

    binners
    Full Member

    in a handful of seconds

    I make that 5 seconds

    Clearly you’ve never been to Bacup

    6? 7? Possibly more…

    midlifecrashes
    Full Member

    Look what’s just turned up!

    retrorick
    Full Member

    Hammer the d lock back into shape and it should work.

    midlifecrashes
    Full Member

    20 seconds leaning on it in the vice and it’s good as new!

    stevextc
    Free Member

    but given that most thieves are opportunists, rather than pro’s

    That may or not to true depending on definitions and stuff but I think most “decent” bikes stolen are increasingly hit by pro’s.

    To be honest, I think if someone turns up with an angle grinder then all bets are off anyway, whatever the lock is.

    You can cut through a alloy or carbon frame in a few seconds with a hacksaw not that much longer for a steel frame .. or take off 80% of the value with a couple of Allen keys… and perhaps T25..

    Cougar
    Full Member

    “good as new” is doing some heavy lifting there. 😁

    Where was the key?

    irc
    Full Member

    I park my bikes in central Glasgow quite a lot. Usually while I am having a pint. I tend to choose places where there is a window letting me see the bike though. So it only needs to stop the thief long enough for me to get to him.

    But I am parking for relatively short periods of time in busy areas. Back when I dealt with thefts of bike reports in the Glasgow area most were either unlocked, stolen from sheds or garages, or locked in a common close where the thief had plenty time to work on the lock unseen. Talking typicaL value non flashy bikes. High end MTBs all bets off.

    I’ve only once seen someone tampering with my bike whilst I was having a drink. Rocked the bike and saw it was locked to a fence then took my front light instead and started walking off. I did an Alan Wells and got my light back without any argument.

Viewing 40 posts - 41 through 80 (of 90 total)

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