Bike Security

Hi all

Just to update everyone, that I now have a chain, lock and pin on the way from Steve.

As promised he offered me a substantial discount which I am VERY happy with but the most impressive thing is the customer service.

It's possible THE best customer service I have ever gotten, from anywhere. Its like your average company is offering "Economy" class service, a few do "Business" class service, but Steve is way up there on 1st Class.

He answered all my emails quickly, at all hours of the day and night with precise, no BS answers.

I even provided him with photos of the area that my bike will be secured to, encompassing a few methods of security and he advised me on things that I would not even know to look out for.

As a man of many passions I am glad bike security is one of them. As you can tell, I would not hesitate to recommend him and his company.

I will be posting pictures of my setup over the weekend once I have the bike.

Well done Steve, I will give you shameless plugs whereever the opportunity presents itself! Word of mouth is the best advertsing, afterall!

has anybody got a pic of the pin in use on a sv?

Originally Posted by Razor

has anybody got a pic of the pin in use on a sv?

Tut ..... gimme 5 minutes


Wanders off mumbling and looking for the camera .

Here is the Left side of my SV , the Almax chain has been fed through the Ground Anchor .... just about and any loose links have been taken up by sliding the Anti-Pinch Pin through a whole cut into the sleeve where the chain is tight and off the ground , the loose ends of the chain are also slid onto the Anti-Pinch Pin and then the A-PP is slid between the Vee of the 2 Cylinders .


The Squire padlock is then clicked onto the A-PP on the other side , this stops it being pulled through the bike and makes life very difficult for any Tea leaves .

The other alternative was to have the chain going to both sides of the A-PP but I didn`t see the need for that . My bedroom is right above this bike , a Camera with night vision monitors the bike and approach to the property and records onto a HDD recorder with timestamp , security lights and the bike is alarmed itself . Oh and the Dog plus a bunch of really nosy neighbours ........ pretty much covers that then

Do you use this for home only or do you carry some/all of it for going out?

Are you Mad ?

Dude , the chain is the longest one Almax do I think , or not far off . I collected it from an Orger near Manchester and put it in my top box , I actually lofted the front end up 3 times on the way home , once was on a slight incline , the next time was on the slip road onto the motorway and the last occasion was gassing it to get to the outer lane before some cars ........... I was eating my heart . The chain is an absolute beast and weighs a LOT . when I am out and about on far flung journeys I have a really nasty Motrax chain that basically stops you wheeling it away . It`ll put up as much resistance as cold chewing gum but hopefully the alarm will be enough to alert me . The only time I ever left the bike alone in a very risky situation was recently in London right near the Barbican , overnight in a Solo M/C Parking bay . That was a fretful night but it was teeming with cameras on that street so that may have helped . Then again with false plates and masks they wouldn`t care .

Originally Posted by xXBADGERXx

Are you Mad ?

The chain is an absolute beast and weighs a LOT .

+1, i have the same chain its proper heavy, i have mine installed through a Yanchor max 90 which fits the 19mm almax and another datatool chain which is a bit smaller, both through different parts of the bike, its a good setup and gives me real peace of mind

Not so much mad, just not seen it in the flesh yet. My only recollection of bike chains was one I had with my ped at 9 years ago which I used to carry round with me under the seat

Mind you, I dont plan on leaving the bike for any period of time in risky situations.

At work it will be on private property and probably just rideouts.

Might get a cheap alarmed disk lock just to carry about though.

Originally Posted by hongman

It's possible THE best customer service I have ever gotten, from anywhere. Its like your average company is offering "Economy" class service, a few do "Business" class service, but Steve is way up there on 1st Class.
...Well done Steve, I will give you shameless plugs whereever the opportunity presents itself! Word of mouth is the best advertsing, afterall!

Gee, shucks I can't say that we will always answer e-mails at 11pm, but yours wasn't the first and probably won't be the last.

Originally Posted by xXBADGERXx

...The other alternative was to have the chain going to both sides of the A-PP but I didn't see the need for that.

Fair enough, but I would say our general guidance is that you should put the chain onto both ends of the Pin except in situations where it is absolutely obvious (to a thief) that the head (or padlock end) of the Pin can't possibly be pulled through. To my mind, that means the Pin is going through a hollow rear axle or something just as solid. We deliberately made the head of the Pin too big to pull through those hollow axles, even on BMW single-siders or MVs that have heeeooouge axles. If the thief thinks he might be able to pull it through, he might have a go and although he may be extremely unlikely to succeed, just him having a go is likely to cause damage, which is bad news for you. However, all of this is a trade-off against usability, indeed there are some situations where a 16/19mm chain will fit through the frame itself but it is so awkward that people don't want the hassle of doing that every day, and that's another situation where the Pin can help. We all make our own decisions about the hassle vs. the cost vs. the security. Every one of those is important to consider in our opinion. A lot of the 'security' aspect is really a mind-game with the scrote - if it looks impossible to defeat, you're already on the home straight with it as a deterrent; if it looks like there may be a chance for the thief to get lucky, it's not a good solution.

Originally Posted by hongman

Do you use this for home only or do you carry some/all of it for going out?

The majority of bike thefts happen from home, so that is generally the first priority.

We do have some customers that use a Pin to give them better security when out & about. That usually means people have either a short Pin (e.g. for the rear axle situation) or they have some panniers to carry a longer Pin and chain & lock safely. The Pin does enable some people to use much shorter chains than would otherwise be required, but again that is most pronounced with the rear axle setup. Personally, I would not carry a 490mm Pin and even a 1.5m 16mm chain and SS65CS padlock on a bike. We do not encourage people to carry chains around their shoulders, and rucksacks soon get very uncomfortable if they've got about 10kg of unforgiving metalwork inside. I've got a lockbag that I've strapped to the pillion seat but in my experience they tend to creep forwards, even with a 13mm chain and smaller padlock. That is usually about the limit - a 13mm chain and SS50CS or 'Untouchable' padlock - for what I've personally carried around on a bike. We do offer dead short 16mm or 19mm chains, but they usually force you to just go round the wheel. Again, it's a personal decision, but I wouldn't want to come off a bike with a chain round my neck! If we've been doing a trackday and one of us has been in the car and the other riding the bike, or we've had both bikes on a trailer, then we would certainly use a 16mm chain to lock the bikes overnight at the track or at the hotel.

In fact, another aspect for portable security is what you are able to chain the bike to when you're away from home: If you've only got some railings then they are probably not as tough as a 13mm chain anyway, so there's little point in using a 16mm chain as the thief will probably just cut the railings anyway! Obviously, you should try to chain the bike to the most solid thing possible, but the real world is often not as cooperative as we would like. Oh, watch out about using road signs like the typical 'no parking' signs - lots of bikes have been nicked by someone lifting them over the top of the sign! That certainly happens more with pushbikes than motorbikes, but it happens with them, too. Sometimes the signpost itself is pulled out of the ground - council workers don't always concrete them in that well, I guess!

Always try to think like a thief and look for the weak link in the defence, even if it's not obvious. Remove that weakness, or protect it, and you've got better security.

Hope that helps,

Steve.

They aint pulling the head or the padlock through any part of the bike on my setup , it is also far easier and quicker for me to lock the bike up in the dead of Winter or piddling it down with Rain and in the dark (security lights don`t light up the wrong side of the bike). And when I need to get the heck out of my house in the morning and I am running late , it`s key in , lock open , slide pin out , put lock back on the end of pin and chuck onto floor and leg it to work