securing bikes in garage

danlightbulb

hi all.

i have garage with up and over door and concrete floor.

can anyone please recommend a ground anchor and chain that isnt too expensive but resistent to quick removal by burglers please?

mamil314

I liked Pragmasis products in the past - if you cannot get away with Wickes parts.

danlightbulb

Links to suitable products would be really helpful. the pragmasis stuff is too expensive for me.

mamil314

Brodude there's a few anchors on their home page alone, do you even internet:

https://securityforbikes.com/

danlightbulb

Hi yeah that stuff is too expensive. its a chunk of bent steel im not paying £70.

mamil314

O.K.

danlightbulb

I want to spend about £50 inc anchor chain and padlock. Doesnt have to be impenetrable to nuclear attack, just enough to prevent opportunistic snatching with cheap bolt cutters.

jamski

Is your bike insured? If so, is there a particular lock that is required? For instance mine requires a sold secure silver lock. Those along are potentially £30 minimum, before you have even bought something to bolt it to.

danlightbulb

My contents insurance covers the garage but i do need to check the terms yeah. I looked at separate bike insurance but its a rip off.

jamski

danlightbulb wrote:

My contents insurance covers the garage but i do need to check the terms yeah. I looked at separate bike insurance but its a rip off.

Where did you look. My Pro FS was insured for £5 a month. That included accidental damage to the bike, theft from anywhere as long as it was locked within their guidelines, and covered clothing and accessories too. And it's to replace for the value of the bike as new, not what it was currently worth. So even after a few years, you'd still get the full value back. Even my Bird is only about £9 for the same cover.

Seems pretty good value for piece of mind to me.

https://cycles.assetsure.com/?introducer=209000

norvernrob

Buy two onguard gold secure D locks from eBay for 20 quid each. Fill a big bucket with postcrete and sink one of the locks in, leaving the D sticking out. Then lock your bike to it with the other lock. If someone wants to try and carry 50kg of concrete which is locked to a bike, good luck to them.

danlightbulb

jamski wrote:

danlightbulb wrote:

My contents insurance covers the garage but i do need to check the terms yeah. I looked at separate bike insurance but its a rip off.

Where did you look. My Pro FS was insured for £5 a month. That included accidental damage to the bike, theft from anywhere as long as it was locked within their guidelines, and covered clothing and accessories too. And it's to replace for the value of the bike as new, not what it was currently worth. So even after a few years, you'd still get the full value back. Even my Bird is only about £9 for the same cover.

Seems pretty good value for piece of mind to me.

https://cycles.assetsure.com/?introducer=209000

£9 per month is my quote. £5 would be ok i guess but not £9. My car insurance is only 4x higher.

steve_sordy

I bought four cheap sliding bolts, the sort you see on gates. I riveted two to each up and over door and drilled holes in the concrete to take the bolts. I screwed shut the windows and added a second high security lock to the garage man access door. Both bikes and a steel workstand are chained and padlocked to each other.

I accept that this will only slow down a determine thief. I'm hoping they will go somewhere else before bothering me.

FishFish

I made a ground anchor with a U of 0.75 inch rebar with some wire threads on each leg. Dug in to the concrete floor and cemented it in place.

My brother told me I should have heat treated it first with a blowlamp and cooled it in oil to make it hard because rebar is high carbon steel.

steve_sordy

FishFish wrote:

I made a ground anchor with a U of 0.75 inch rebar with some wire threads on each leg. Dug in to the concrete floor and cemented it in place.

My brother told me I should have heat treated it first with a blowlamp and cooled it in oil to make it hard because rebar is high carbon steel.

Re-bar is ordinary mid steel and not high carbon. It needs to be ductile, so high carbon steel would be the wrong material choice. Re-bars are toughened up by twisting when cold, or water splashed during rolling (when red hot).

Because re-bar is mild steel, it will not respond in the way that your brother suggested. There is an easy way to check which steel it is, called the spark test. All you need is a simple high speed grinder.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spark_testing

sniper68

How much is your bike worth?
Can you afford to replace it if £70 is too expensive for security?
I currently have about £7ks worth in my garage,with an £800 addition for my lad coming next week.I have,in the past had well over £10ks worth in there.For me,regardless of insurance,security is paramount.I have 3 ground anchors fastened to the wall of my house.There are 4(currently) bikes hung up and each is secured to each anchor by a separate chain..so three points of security for each bike,plus a Kryptonite cable secures the 4 to each other with a D-Lock.All chains/anchors are Motorcycle specific.I also have drop bolts securing the bottom of the garage door and the back garden is quite secure as it's encased in Conifers.
The last time I checked I'd spent around £500 on security.That's less than 10% of the cost of what it is protecting.No Brainer IMO.For what it's worth there have been no break-ins at all on the Cul-de-Sac we live on in the 18 years we've lived here but I'd rather be safe than sorry!
Insurance BTW is "named Items" on my House Insurance.Up to £15k for an extra £6 a month 8)

On the subject of Re-bar.
Heating it with a blowtorch and quenching it in Oil will have absolutely no effect whatsever on the properties of the Steel as it came from the rolling mill :roll:
Rebar is heated/quenched/heated many times through-out the rolling process at much higher temperatures than a blow-torch can accomplish...and for much longer :roll:
You could probaly cut the Re-bar with a good set of 4ft Bolt-crops as it's designed to strengthen Concrete not used as an anchor
(I've been in the Steel making Industry over 30 years on and off(more on for the last 20) and although we don't currently roll re-bar I've made enough of it in the past to know what it's about!)

JGTR

danlightbulb wrote:

My contents insurance covers the garage but i do need to check the terms yeah. I looked at separate bike insurance but its a rip off.

I agree, total rip-off. They all wanted minimum £20 a month for my 3 bikes - £5 a month on home insurance with exact same cover.

Floor anchor and chain for insurance purposes, plus need chain when away from home for it to be insured.

steve_sordy

I spent a lot of money on my bikes, part of which is why they weigh as little as they do. According to most insurers, to make them safe whilst away from home I have to carry a Gold Secure padlock and chain. This weighs a friggin' ton and completely negates the point of having a light bike!

So I don't carry a heavy lock. I just never let the bike leave my sight unless it is locked up inside my car, hotel room, or other secure area (I used a pub cellar one trip out, surrounded by beer barrels and chillers).

In any case, all they have to do is to cut through the frame and take the bike anyway. Then break it up and sell off all the components. There is a lot of money in fork, shock, wheels, transmission, bars, brakes, dropper....... The frame is the most traceable element, so why not just scrap it?

JGTR

So I don't carry a heavy lock. I just never let the bike leave my sight unless it is locked up inside my car, hotel room, or other secure area (I used a pub cellar one trip out, surrounded by beer barrels and chillers).

No one actually carries a Sold Secure Gold Lock on their rides, that would be daft, it’s for use when securing bikes in the situation you describe above or it won’t be covered if it was to get stolen.

mamil314

*blush

jeatsy

You can get D locks with motion sensors and an alarm which sounds if they're moved. I've got one of these:

http://www.oxfordproducts.com/motorcycl ... mw_x_14mm/

It works well in a shed or garage, where you don't expect any movement. It's pretty sensitive, so personally I wouldn't use it at a public bike rack where your bike might legitimately get moved an inch or two.

FishFish

steve_sordy wrote:

FishFish wrote:

I made a ground anchor with a U of 0.75 inch rebar with some wire threads on each leg. Dug in to the concrete floor and cemented it in place.

My brother told me I should have heat treated it first with a blowlamp and cooled it in oil to make it hard because rebar is high carbon steel.

Re-bar is ordinary mid steel and not high carbon. It needs to be ductile, so high carbon steel would be the wrong material choice. Re-bars are toughened up by twisting when cold, or water splashed during rolling (when red hot).

Because re-bar is mild steel, it will not respond in the way that your brother suggested. There is an easy way to check which steel it is, called the spark test. All you need is a simple high speed grinder.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spark_testing

Thanks and you are right - mild steel it is!

I sharpened up a bit of 1 inch rebar to make a crowbar, tree digging thing - I guess that the tip will just get blunt. Any way of hardening it or should I just stick it up my bro's @rse and att to the mains?

steve_sordy

FishFish wrote:

..................


Thanks and you are right - mild steel it is!

I sharpened up a bit of 1 inch rebar to make a crowbar, tree digging thing - I guess that the tip will just get blunt. Any way of hardening it or should I just stick it up my bro's @rse and att to the mains?

Starting with mild steel, the only way is to get some carbon into the material. The ancient sword masters used to do this by soaking the material at red heat in carbon-rich material. This puts carbon into the surface. That surface can then be hardened to give a wear resistant surface. I first did that when I was a 15 year old schoolboy.

I also fixed my Dad's soft stone chisel by properly hardening and tempering the chisel in our coke-fired boiler. My Dad was amazed! Err, I digress!

Case hardening is no good for a sword, so the sword makers had to twist and fold the material multiple times to distribute the carbon rich steel throughout the body, to make it more homogeneous. It was a slow way to make high carbon steel. But when the blade was polished, a distinctive and wonderful pattern was revealed!

Anyway, a much shorter answer to your question is mostly no. But if you have the patience and the equipment, you could have a go at case-hardening.

mamil314

Do you iaido, Steve

sniper68

But it would be quicker to just PAY for an anchor that is hardened as you'll really struggle to get everything right at home.

steve_sordy

mamil314 wrote:

Do you iaido, Steve

No, but I'm pretty good with my weed slasher!

I need to work on my saya though.