Lessen the Chance of Your Bike Getting Stolen

With new bike season already starting it is good idea to insure that your bike is well protected against theft. Every year 3.5 million bikes get stolen in Europe alone so this is no joke! In this instructables I will share small trick on how I made my velocipede less appealing for thieves.

Most stolen bikes will be sold on black markets. Like you guessed new unscratched bikes will go best. But scratched, easily distinguishable bikes are hard to sell and thus won´t get stolen so much. At least in theory.

So to give my bicycle something unique I decided to carve my name on it!

Step 1: Carving

The process was quite simple actually.

First I took my bike to workshop and started sketching what I wanted to carve. Regular pencil worked well.

Then I took a dremel tool with thin carving bit and followed the lines. Later on I refined the letters with thicker bit. Carving on aluminum frame was super easy.

To bring the letters forward and to seal it all from weather I used bright red nail polish. I applied three coats to be sure.

To clean it up I once again took a dremel and used a small plastic brush. If you do this be sure that your brush is soft enough that it does not remove your bike´s layer of paint.

Step 2: The Result

This will definitely not insure that my bike won´t get stolen but I hope that when a thief sees my masterpiece he will reconsider his intentions.
Of course I will still use locks to secure my bicycle.

Cheers!

Comments

[SamS78]

MY RESALE VALUE 0_0

[Lopany]

Nice instructableand a great idea, but I don't think you need it if you live in Istanbul. I throw my bike at the sidewalk and go into the mall, a few hours later the same position. Istanbul is known as the 7 hills city. so if you are not 100% cyclist you do not ride.

[Yonatan24]

My dad did that to my bike many years ago too.

It won't really stop it from getting stolen, You'll just be able to find it easier later if it gets stolen...

[grothebarry]

i agree with PurplePeople if its an aluminum frame, keep a watch on the finish around the carved part for any cracks in the finish. if there is a crack in the finish chances are the aluminum is stress cracking. Especially around the 3 carved lines since you made it follow the radius of the tubes. Basically you could have given it a controlled fracture point. If your roads are rough, I would do a thorough inspection once a week. Especially if you ride a lot of cobble stones, that puts a lot of vibration stress on your frame tubes. It looks cool, but just want you to be safe.

[PurplePeople]

Aluminum is much more prone to fatigue failure than steel. Scratches are one thing, but grooves deep enough to fill with paint could create stress risers more likely to propagate into a crack. Hopefully, any stress fractures occur on the outside and not the inside where you can't see it.

[CraftAndu]

Perhaps. Though I think that grooves this small aren't a big deal. I mostly removed the paint and barely grinder the aluminium. Cheers!

[batvette]

You might have been okay with those letters but the 3 lines... nuh uh. I doubt you will crack your frame but wouldnt be surprised if you did.