The London Program investigates the £27 million pound crime wave that is seeing thousands of bicycles being stolen from the capital's streets. Our reporter catches some professional bike thieves in action and finds out how easy it is to steal a bike in central London
Bike crime is organised, and is a very serious & common crime in the U.K (worldwide too). A bike is stolen every time you've counted 71 seconds here. This video shows what happens in London, but there are others being targeted i.e Downhill MTBs and expensive road bikes at trails or even burglaries. Let's fight the thieves by getting better security for bikes, and being more wiser to their tricks.
Check out
my website on bike security and
why Almax chains are better than others.
Replace "daughter" for "bike".
I know, been said before. But still applicable
For me, my is friend, one of my best friend.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnEtHDPAfGw
where can i get one?
When in public places, use a strong lock. I couldn't recommend any other lock other than the Almax Series III or IV with Squire locks. But don't just use one chain, use a d-lock or two for your wheels too., this will make it harder for thieves to get through the locks and stall their time. Use alarmed padlocks too, these help as they cause attention and sometimes scare off thieves.
Avoid cable locks, unless you have a heavy duty chain and (two) d-lock(s) and make sure the cable lock is tight and well made.
If using D-Locks, make sure there is no space for a bottle jack device to squeeze in between any gaps as thieves do this to pop them open.
Be aware of being followed to your property. This has been a case or plenty, where people are followed from trails by thieves.
Always ask for permission from shops or work to leave your bike at work indoors, if they refuse, use a 'beater bike.' A beater bike is a cheap supermarket/old bike of worthless value and thieves won't bother most of the time with them. Keep your good bike at home.
Hope none of your bikes are stolen, and for all your info, visit my website: http://bicycle-security.webs.com
Alex.
I seriously dont let my bike out of my sight. My bulldog and .45 watch over it in my house after bedtime.
Need a guard for your house get a dog
"I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don't have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills; skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my BIKE go now, that'll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don't, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you."
That will be all.
Also, for home security, read the following thread, it shows all sorts of advice, mainly from Met police, some by me -
www.pinkbike.com/forum/listcomments/?threadid=104705
This website helped recover a stolen bike locally. Also, the thief was busted for another stolen item they tried to sell on craigslist.
A few weeks ago I had my bike locked up along with my friends, and another high-dollar bike behind the local bike shop. In the half hour we were there, I popped my head out to check on the bikes 4 times. Call it paranoia, I call it being careful.
BTW here in Norway yesterday started to snow, and already there`s 0.6 meter No cycling this year any more
I remember this homeless guy that stole a bike from the LBS, the LBS ran him down and beat the snot out of him. Then, plastered it all over FaceBook as a 'trophy' and had a Pabsts after for their 'good work'. Its nice to know that the LBS gets its kicks by beating a man and bragging about it. A man that had 1/100th of what their spoiled dickhead selves had. "needless to say, I dont support them now' and Im not supporting bike thiefs, I had 3 bikes stolen while in college. I was heart broken, but it does make you wonder, what makes people go to the end to do something such as this?
In a way, I feel sorry for them.
They Was locked up and alarmed next to shops with CCTV mine had two locks and disc locks we had been gone for half an hour and on our approach to where we left te bikes had us scratching our heads, both gone but just a walk up the road there was mine alarm still going off and no1 around I was glad to see it again (it was just in a cul de sac ) I sat with my mate and waited then a huge van turned up pulled up along side my bike they popped open the back doors and there was my mates bike I was calm my mate kind of lost it with the two people long story short we had our bikes back and the two lads kind of worse for wear there excuses where they had been ask to pick them up
my bikes are kept in a room upstairs in my house, I have two staffordshire bull terriers who DO not like anybody they don't know in the house...chance of death very high!
when I ride to work i have a security camera on the bikes at all times with a live feed to my desk and several other peoples...anyone gets caught down there they have no escape..any thieving scumbag who wants to steal what I work hard for WILL be punished by me...not our pansy laws...note to thieves...you WILL lose digits, teeth, possibly your eyesight and your balls..id make sure you remember it for the rest of your worthless life
..peace to all
entrapment of the highest degree.
not that they shouldn't be punished but don't play the "in america" card
My previous employer had a bike rack just in front of reception where security guards sat, with CCTV on the surrounding area. Bikes still went! I used to just take my bike inside the office with me and lean it against a wall :-) not great for the company image, but my bike's my bike!
The sting bikes that were stolen were targeted by thieves who knew what they were looking for, bikes they could sell on which were locked up with pathetic locks. All the bikes witnessed being stolen on the video were with flimsy wire locks cut with even small gauge wire cutters, the two being watched by the Police were obviously spotted and scoped out by experienced bike thieves who knew an easy target. Presumably they had already stolen all the other easy to steal bikes off those two stands previously. I guess the moral is, if you have to ride in London (or many other major cities, even small towns) then a) make the bike more shed like so it is less attractive to steal, and b) lock it up with a sturdier lock than the one next to it. Best of all keep it out of sight, I guess most city offices don't have space to store everyone's bikes though.
I can understand people not wanting to wade in, I mean come on if you were minding your own business on your own walking through town and you saw someone with a portable angle grinder cutting a bike lock in the middle of London, would you intervene? No chance whatsoever. It's not the fact that as Boris (I think it was him) said in the video no-one takes responsibility for the community anymore, I think what is far more likely is no-one wants to get potentially seriously injured playing the good Samaritan and saving someone else's bike from being stolen. Pretty depressing really, things like this could make you despair in humanity.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTA3JsZWiec
www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8UpUj_8tWI
www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCbU83_G6nA
Personally, I'm more a fan of fighting the thieves by beating the holy f*ck out of them...
Bigger than me, yes. But I had more passion..... also, did I mention I was still in full armour from a ride and still wearing my kevlar knuckled gloves which saved me from cutting my knuckles on his now broken teeth.
I HATE THIS PEOPLE !