[Closed] Bike security and Ground anchor advice!

Look at driveway alarms, we’ve got three sheds with one in each and the alarm in the house, they don’t have an led light on the sensor unit so the scrotes don’t know they’ve been sensed.

I've got a couple of these in my garage:

Oxford wall/ground anchor

I've put down two ground anchors to make it more difficult to get access to both with things like an angle grinder, the oxford one above is nice, but i'd definitely get two, or go that little extra and get the kryptonite one, i bought one of those and one of the bird ones (like the oxford), seems to work well, other security measures are all there to really add time and noise to any attempt to get the bikes, including having a 22mm chain lock!

I recently removed a ground anchor from an old workshop, took me a few mins with a battery chisel to dig out the bolts. Agree with the above, add as many layers of security you can to slow people down.

Motorbike security stuff tends to be more robust, bigger chains etc. If you don't have to carry it around go for this kind of thing.
Also, you will never stop anyone determined enough, your objective should be that they have to make so much noise getting anything out that you/neighbours hear them and scare them off
https://bikersunited.co.uk/best-motorcycle-ground-anchors/
Can you cut a hole in the floor and concrete it in? Something like that Y shaped one at the bottom

Also, think about access routes. I had the luxury of building my lean-to brick shed from scratch. The windows for example are very slightly too small to fit a 26" wheel through and would be a right PITA to get an assempled frame-fork out of. So they would have to use the door. Which means breaking into the shared porch, waking me and next door, and then the door to the shed which is off that. Breaking down two doors without waking anyone in the eight flat block would be tricky.
Anyway, window bars if you have windows?

Don’t fancy getting my bike stolen.
I’ve got a workshop/garage not attached to my house. I has a concrete floor. I’m thinking about Getting a ground anchor.

A ground anchor will stop or slow down an opportunistic thief, anyone who has gone to the lengths of breaking into a garage will likely have the means to get past a ground anchor (battery powered angle grinder with the right cutting disc will be through it in seconds). Not to say I wouldn't do the same but making as much noise as possible before they get to the bikes would be more of a deterrent. My dad used a panic alarm rigged to a hook by a length of fishing line on his shed door after 2 of his bikes were nicked, just long enough to be able to carefully unhook it from outside if you knew it was there, but if the door was opened anymore than 2 inches the alarm would go off. It did when someone tried the shed again about a year later but nothing was taken. Cheaper than a proper alarm as well

I would say rule 1 is not to advertise the bikes are there!

At my previous house I had 2 motorcycles and a mountain bike taken from my garage (attached to the house) in one hit. At the rear of the house was a gate to the garden with a shed, behind the shed was my motorcycle trailer. The police believe “someone” was having a look over my fence saw the trailer and decided the garage was worth investigating.

So, be discrete with your bikes, chuck in the boot of the car rather than a bike rack if you can, If you must have a rack, try and cover them and maybe take extra care when you get home. When returning from a bike park keep an eye on who is behind you.

Don’t clean your pride and joy on the drive for all to see.

If you go on holiday consider moving the bike to a friend’s place or even in the house.

Oh and if you sell your bike be extra careful on eBay etc. I often meet in a neutral place.

And also take a look at your on-line security. Does your FB profile pic have pics of your expensive toy open to all ? You profile pic and background are always public. It only takes a thief to see you on line and Google your name, it can pull up your address from all sorts of places.

On that note, always Google your name and see what it does come up with, I found a few sites (like Linkedin) where I needed to change security settings so I did not come up in searches.

I’ve got a couple of these in my garage:

Oxford wall/ground anchor

Sold Secure Bicycle - Silver

This translates as pretty worthless. There's something silly like 3 levels above this just in the Bicycle category then you move up to motorcycle etc.

As the man above says, only stop opportunistic thief

I've got several, the best one I've got seems to be this one

https://www.halfords.com/cycling/bike-accessories/bike-locks/halfords-advanced-ground-anchor-225566.html

Great helpful advice 👍

My garage/workshop has two doors to get in. I guess. A decent anchor and an alarm of some kind.
But I guess if they really want it they'll take it.
But think there's plenty of cars and nice motor bikes to steal before mine.
But i don't want to take any risk!

Please keep the advice coming .

Cheers

I would break a hole in the floor and drop a big chain into some concrete. Best kind of thing would be a ships anchor chain! That's gonna take time and a lot of noise to cut. Chain is better than a bar or solid steel as it has no leverage. Then, rig up some kind of secret alert like the fishing line idea above so the lights come on/alarm/whatever.

Or just buy a crap bike

I have a pragmasis double doofer and 16mm chain.
I wrap the chain around the frames as much as I can to keep it off the floor.

I keep my battery grinder in the house. 9" grinder, Sledge hammers and chisels do live in the garage unfortunately though but the outside socket is turned off from inside the house.

Ground anchors are actually pretty simple things, basically barring really stupid design, more metal = more secure. More bolts should usually be the same. Surrounding the base with a simple sealant- silicone or polyurethane or whatever- should make getting a lever under it a bit harder too. A decent D lock in a hole filled with concrete is pretty brutally effective too.

Just make sure it's big enough for your chain! I added a basic Oxford anchor outside more recently for those times when I want to leave bikes outside for a bit and discovered it won't accept my big Squire chain. Which more or less means it's restricted to chains that can be boltcuttered in seconds.

On that note, my usual rant about chains. Most chains are shite. Even sold secure gold, thatcham, ART, very expensive chains can be shite. There are highly rated highly approved products out there that a thief can break with boltcutters quicker than you can probably unlock it with the key. Squire, Pragmasis, Almax make good stuff, probably others too but those are 3 I know. Good locks are expensive and they need good padlocks which are also expensive, Pragmasis' little Roundlock is total genius though, not just cheaper than good padlocks but also naturally hard to attack.

(There isn't a single commercial bike lock test/certification that's actually based on realistic attacks- the reason being, if they were, they'd have to give most products terrible marks and wouldn't make any money. They defend themselves by saying "most bikes are stolen with these rubbish attacks" and that's kind of true, but irrelevant- it's like saying more people are killed with knives than with guns, then using a knife to test your new tank. 10/10 Knife Secure Gold. Good locks are not broken with the tools used on bad locks. If you test something by that standard you are saying that it's a competitor with the £5 Tesco cable lock. But that's the industry)

Nothing's impervious of course, anything can be cut with a cordless grinder and some thieves use hydraulic cutters. And every bike can be cut... But most bikes aren't secured well, so you don't have to be sharkproof, you just need to be the faster swimmer. Or try not to be in the water at all.

I went with the Pragmasis beefy bridge and resin in the concrete floor didn't object to cutting a hole in the floor of new shed. Decided the Pragmasis 13mm 2m chain bundled with Squire padlock would be sufficient and in budget. They'd sold out of their round locks.

coach bolts on door hinges, plus security screws that can't be undone. gatemate double throw lock on door from screwfix, only keyhole visible from outside. and another Squire closed shackle padlock higher up on pair of brackets secured with coach bolts.

hopefully I'll never find out if that's all enough. reasonably confident there's easier targets in the area. and my bikes are always dirty bashed and scratched, so not exactly attractive and not high end either.

For a lock to be boltcutter proof it needs at least a 16mm shackle - this will stop pretty much any boltcutter which round here is the scrotes weapon of choice. My lock - kryptonite m18 has saved my bike at least twice

battery powered angle grinder with the right cutting disc will be through it in seconds

not a proper sized one it won't.

Get yourself a Torc Maxi Ground Anchor and a Protector 19mm Chain, RoundLock RL21 & RL21A Combo.

Yes the chain and the ground anchor can be cut but it is going to take a lot of time and noise to do it. having the chain off the ground and the anchor somewhere it can't easily be accessed will slow down thieves. That is all you can really do is slow them down.

Yep, make it hard to get, and make it noisy to get. If you have two doors to the garage then do you need both to be easy to open, or is one the up and over, the other the side, can you park up in front to make the up and over near impossible to break into, if they then get in the side, how easy is it to move about and what will they have access too (lights, power, etc).

You can do more to secure before hitting it with anchors and chains, for me the big benefit i have from anchors and big chains (18mm 22mm, etc) is that they give me the confidence that if someone tries to cut them, they'll spend a fair while and make a lot of noise doing it, attracting attention, it also gives me the insurance requirements i need (immovable object, solid gold, etc).

Reality though says if someone wants it, they can just cut through the bike in a few seconds, and salvage a few bits, but not sure they'd see the point in that with the way i run locks through wheels, forks, etc!

It’s easy enough to add a garage as another zone on a typical house alarm. I wired a Raspberry Pi via a relay to my alarm control box and wrote a script to text me if the alarm goes off.

The guys stealing bikes have pro cordless angle grinders that will go through anything, and whats unusual about the sound of grinding coming from a shed/garage 😕

Find a spot in the house is my advice. Make it work.

As for alarms. Whens the last time you heard one in your neighborhood, and went running around to see what the problem was ? Maybe the nearest neighbours will take a peek out of the window, but its not usual as its not an uncommon occurrence to hear them.

I have a chunky chain and wall anchor from Pragmasis. They have loads of information about the different types of security, what works well and where. They’re not the cheapest but hugely worth the money.

Have a look:

https://securityforbikes.com/Security-Products-Selector-Bicycles.php