The type of people willing to ride, much less steal, a $75 bike aren’t going to be carrying much cash. So you’re not really attracting the right targets.
There’s two things that will get your bike stolen. Having a shitter lock than everyone else or a nicer bike. I’d heavily recommend at least having a better lock
I have an ebike worth about $2k given it’s range and top speed. However, I only lock it to extremely secure objects and use a 10lb, 14 mm chain to secure it. So you’ve either gotta pick the lock which took LockPickingLawyer 2 minutes to do in a vice, cut whatever it’s attached to with an angle grinder, or cut through the chain.
I doubt anyone is picking the lock, so they have to get through whatever it’s attached to, at which point the chain is still locking the awkward to carry, 100lb bike stationary. If they go for the chain I figure they’ll likely misalign the cutoff wheel at least once and it’ll explode in their face. Needless to say I don’t worry about my bike for day to day use, and if you get a similar lock setup you won’t have to either.
Sure. My area has low crime, my bike isn’t worth a ton (was $500-600 new), and I use a well-regarded u-lock. Never had it stolen.
But OP is talking about trying to get the bike stolen so they can jump the thief and steal their money. That doesn’t seem very effective with a $75 bike, which is going to be some big-box hand-me-down pile of crap that most homeless people are going to ignore, much less motivated bike thieves. If you want your bike stolen, it needs to be worth the time to bring it to the pawn shop.
I don’t forsee a 14 mm chain being cut by bolt cutters that would be reasonable to carry around. Especially considering the hardness of the steel it’s made of. I just don’t think it’s worth the effort given the amount of people using cable and D locks that can be cut with handheld shears.
Disclaimer: This post advises you to commit crimes. Do not take this post as fact.
Disclaimer pt.2: You may get away with it “in Texas, at night, and on your own property,” but you have to hit all 3/3 of those, if you have 0/3, 1/3, or 2/3, you are also going to be prosecuted.
Can confirm. Left my 1986 SAAB 900 SPG unlocked for a decade in a couple major cities downtown areas. The only thing anyone ever took was some of my quarters. They also never broke the window to get in, and then realize it was a manual. Didn’t even take the radio, as I did take the faceplate inside with me
While I dont necessarily agree, I do agree that petty theft affects regular people all the damn time, you cant do anything about it or you can catch an assault charge, the cops cant or wont do anything about it either so you just have to accept that sometimes people are going to take your shit and nothing is going to happen.
It would be nice to know those people get their comeuppance from time to time.
nah bike thieves are among the lowest of the low, among child abusers and oil execs. Utter sociopathy. It’s one of the scummiest things you can do, hands down.
I remember there was some guy who installed spyware on a phone that couldn’t be wiped off by normal means. Stuff that gave him remote camera access, location, file access, everything. Then he got that phone stolen and made a documentary about this dude’s life.
I think it was baked into the OS somehow (probably what you said). He disabled system updates as well so the OS didn’t wipe. The only way it could have been removed was flashing the OS, but you’d have to find out it was there to begin with.
Seriously, it’s just mugging. The bicycle part is a whole separate issue, if you do this you’re just mugging people. Same crime, same potential legal consequences, same potential for getting a sharpened screwdriver in your kidney.