They stole my bungie cords....

[Jer]

Off my luggage rack...

Yeah, can ya believe it?

That or they fell off. Which I doubt.

I went on a small ride to the next town south of me Sunday morning. Went into some hole in the wall cafe for breakfast. Thats when somebody must have nabbed them.

Unbelievable.

[patrick_777]

Could have been worse. They could have stolen your bike.

[bonehead]

Just look on the side of the road, you'll find some replacements pretty quick!

[burkbuilds]

If I'm not strapping something down, my bungees always go inside my saddle bags. Never lost them off my bike, but I've had a lot of them disappear out of my truck at Lowe's and Home Depot while I was inside!

[mrlmd1]

How often do you think people steal stuff out of saddlebags? They're not locked and represent an open invitation for prying eyes. The only downside to a thief is that he might get caught by the big nasty guy riding the motorcycle.

[Easy Rider]

How often do you think people steal stuff out of saddlebags? They're not locked and represent an open invitation for prying eyes. The only downside to a thief is that he might get caught by the big nasty guy riding the motorcycle.

Most petty theft is a crime of opportunity. I too have had cords disappear if they were in plain sight, where they can be had in a split second such that nobody would notice. I have never had anything INSIDE the bags messed with, even though they are unlocked, because messing with the bag latches would make the punk too conspicuous.

One just needs to figure that anything that is loosely attached to the bike in plain sight WILL eventually disappear. But I don't know why we should expect all bike riders to figure that out since EVERY DAY in the crime reports are thefts of valuable stuff that is left in plain sight in UNLOCKED cars. Stupidity has no limits, it would appear. :roll:

[Jer]

I dont quite follow the last paragraph. Are you saying that I'm an idiot?

[Water Warrior 2]

I dont quite follow the last paragraph. Are you saying that I'm an idiot?

I think he is referring to the unlocked car with stuff easily grabbed. .................That reminds me, I have an unwanted TV to put in the back of the Ranger.

[Easy Rider]

I dont quite follow the last paragraph. Are you saying that I'm an idiot?

Not unless you are in the habit of leaving your car unlocked.....with your wallet laying on the seat. :shocked:

Things like bunje cords are expendible and not worth worrying about.

Now that you know "how things work", you might be an idiot if you think you can put some more cords on the back and expect them to stay there indefinitely. :poke2: :biggrin:

[alanmcorcoran]

My saddlebags lock. :cool:

[alantf]

My saddlebags lock.

So does my Shad luggage box, but a few months back someone got into the underground parking of our apartment block, & apart from a few other thefts he managed to force the lock on my box. Luckily the box was empty, so the moral is - if you park somewhere that thieves can work undetected, make sure that you don't leave anything in even a locked box. To open the outer doors, you need either a key or remote control, but from then on I've always used the brake disc lock when I park there. If they can get in undetected, I'm not going to take the risk that next time they might find a way to steal whole vehicles. :cry:

[alanmcorcoran]

I generally don't leave anything in the saddlebags more valuable than my gloves. And I typically park in a highly visible spot when I am out. As someone said above, the best deterrent is the thief's imagination. They really can't be sure that some big badass biker has their big badass bike in full view. Unless, of course, they see me get off it.

I also often lock my helmet to the seat. There is a thin cable loop-y thing that goes through the D-rings and around a hook under the seat. Has anyone had a locked helmet ripped off? Sometimes it's sort of a pain to bring it into small restaurants and coffeeshops.

[Jer]

Ist it great that we get trained to work under the assumption that our shit will get stolen and we should be ok with it? Even blame ourselves?

Sad.

Yeah, it is what it is. I know. But still, sad. And if we are to blame, its because we allowed it to happen. You know, having voted away all of our rights to act against those who do us wrong.

[Water Warrior 2]

The truly sad part is the so-called trusted friends and relatives we allow in our homes who rip us off. They are just too lazy to actually work for what they want so we become a target. Time to stop or be in a full blown rant.

[burkbuilds]

I've never had anybody mess with my saddle bags but I do try to find "conspicuous" highly visible places to park my bike as a deterrent. I think Easy has a good point, if people don't see it, it's a lot less likely to disappear, having said that, I don't leave expensive stuff in my bags either.

[music man]

I am glad this discussion came up because I have been wanting to mention this for some time now and just never got around to it. Have you guys noticed that even though if you leave something valuable on the seat of your car or in the bed of your truck, the likelyhood of it growing legs and walking off are almost guaranteed, but yet if you leave a 300 dollar helmet on your bike (unlocked) or leave you cell phone and wallet in your unlocked saddlebags, it is almost guaranteed to still be there when you get back (not always in either situation, but on average). Very odd i would say.


I would bet that most of the time it is the thing that was said on here earlier, most people have a pre-concieved notion of what a motorcycle rider looks like (and how mean him and his friends are). Hell half the time one of my sisters leaves her keys in the ignition, helmet on the seat, unlocked leather saddlebags filled with who knows what kind of goodies for a thief, and you KNOW that if she would have done that that many times in her car, she would have been robbed blind, or worse her car would be gone when she came out of a store or whatever.

Just my two cents.

[burkbuilds]

I think Music man is right about there being a psychological deterrent to people stealing stuff from a biker's bike but just like the example in Jer's original post here, they do take stuff off the bikes sometimes. I've seen people leave their helmets just sitting on the bikes, but mine either goes inside with me or get's locked onto the bike. When I first started riding my bike to college, several other riders told me not to leave my helmet outside that 2 or 3 had been stolen the previous quarter, so even though I can see my bike from my classroom window, I bring it in and put it on the coat rack every day.

[Water Warrior 2]

So I actually did put my unwanted TV in the back of the Ranger. Nobody wanted it so I was forced to dispose of it in a traditional way.

[patrick_777]

Nobody wanted it so I was forced to dispose of it in a traditional way.

Leaving it on the side of the road? Putting it in your garage? Giving it to the Salvation Army? Making an aquarium out of it?

[burkbuilds]

Next time just wrap the TV up in gift paper and it'll be gone before you know it!

[mrlmd1]

David Brenner (older comedian from our youth) had a schtick about trying to get rid of an old leather wingback chair.
First he tried to sell it, no offers.
He wanted to throw it out but the garbage men wanted $50 to haul it away, so,
he put it on his front porch with a sign that said "Antique Panamanian Reading Chair. $300,"
and somebody stole it.
Mission accomplished.

By the way, if it's an older analog TV, nobody even wants those things anymore, you have to pay to dispose of it at the dump.

[alanmcorcoran]

A buddy from work and I went on an odyssey about two weeks ago to dispose of 15 older computers. In California you can't just throw them out. We went to about seven places in Recycle Town (my new name for the section of Anaheim where they collect everything from grass clippings to batteries.) We kept getting turned away, but we finally found a place that would take them as long as I signed a paper that said they were not from a business. Two gentlemen even unloaded our obsolete cargo from the Suburban, valet style. We saw some really weird stuff along the way. One place that had a pyramid of old PC's refused to take mine, saying, they "didn't take computers." I asked, "What about those?" "Those are the ones we find hidden in the grass clippings!"

[Jer]

wow.

About all I have had the garbage people refuse here is IA is a microwave.

But ya just wait til someone nearby gets one of those huge dumpsters the size of a train car for a home roofing project or something. Then ya go toss it in.