U-Locks

[jadia]

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=66128&page=1&pp=25Read more... )

Comments

[lesenthusiasm]

Here's a video for those still skeptical:

Quicktime, 970KB

I just picked up a Bic off the street and will be trying this as soon as I get home tonight. Bad news for all.

[ukelele]

All bike locks can be opened fairly quickly by people with proper tools or knowledge. The MIT police used to do workshops on this and I think when my husband was at one of those he saw a Kryptonite lock opened in 45 seconds. The point has never been that they're impossible, or even hard, to open; the point was that many of the other bike locks on the market could be opened in 30, 20 seconds. Given a range of options (as, eg, in a city), thieves will go for the fastest one. So you buy the slowest one. That doesn't mean it's actually slow to crack.

[jadia]

It's not just faster/slower - there's also what tools you need, how obvious it is what you're doing....

What's scary about the u-lock thing is not "someone who wants to steal your bike will be able to", it's that you can do it with a *pen*, and it will look fairly inconspicuous, and that you can figure out how to do it fairly trivially. So, both the tools and knowledge are fairly trivial to come by, as opposed to bolt cutters or lockpickers. I, at least, had assumed it would require slightly more in the way of tools and/or knowledge than other sorts of locks. This seems to suggest otherwise.

Eep.

[dogoncouch]

The kryptonite can be opened without lock-picking implements, though. The thing is if you get searched by police for any reason and they find lockpicks, you automatically go in for questioning unless you're a locksmith, whether or not they think you did something. If you've just got a bic, nobody cares.

[shinxy]

I guess there's going to be a rush to grab chains and padlocks now.