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Comment by djhworld | Hacker News Reader

What happens if another guy with one of these locks comes along and parks his park on the same post as yours?

Also as far as I can tell this lock relies on the poles/posts being of a certain diameter

You just have to trust other cyclists. If you use a regular lock, anyone with another regular lock could lock your bike and screw you anyway.

The thing is with that lock you have a stack, so the first bike on that pole can't get down until the others are gone. With regular locks problems happen only by mistake or by being an ass.

Putting your bike under someone else's is not being an ass?

1 bike -> 1 post. There isn't enough posts for all the bikes.

The stacking problem could be trivially solved by adding a small explosive charge that ejects your bike sideways when needed.

I guess it is, but it would be by using the lock as designed, rather than by being careless.

Either you have one bike per post, which is not efficient or enough, or you stack them.

So basically, though it's an interesting idea, this design is very impractical.

There's bike vandalism to watch out for, too. It's not very common, but few locks protect against it. Locks handle a much more common occurrence, that people want to steal a bike for material gain, not only for the detriment of the bike's owner.

Vandalism is just as common as theft in the Washington DC area. Usually if they can't break your lock, they break your bike instead.

DC has replaced some bike racks with bike lockers that totally enclose the bike. The downside is the lockers take up a lot of space so there are only a few of them at each metro station.

> What happens if another guy with one of these locks comes along and parks his park on the same post as yours?

Presumably, if these were mass-produced, each device would have a rare or unique signal similar to car remotes.

> Also as far as I can tell this lock relies on the poles/posts being of a certain diameter

I thought of that too. There are standard light pole sizes, but they might be different in different countries. I wonder if it would work s well on wooden posts.

I think the bigger issue would be how would your bike descend with another bike under it?

Same issue as "what happens if someone locks their bike next to mine and they are dumb enough to put their lock through my bike".

You'd have to assume that anyone who double parks on the same post with a lock like this probably isn't smart enough to ride the bike in the first place.

The actual question should be "what happens when there are too many people using these locks so no-one can find any places to use it?"

> You'd have to assume that anyone who double parks on the same post with a lock like this probably isn't smart enough to ride the bike in the first place.

Such thinking is exactly the sort that is guaranteed to end up with your bike stuck up a lamp post due to a double parking incident ;)

(it doesn't quite fit, but the spirit of "Foolproof systems do not take into account the ingenuity of fools" applies)

Your bike would still be stuck up the pole until they removed their double parked bike.

Sorry, I misunderstood. I thought he was saying the other person would use his remote to steal your bike.

Same thing that happens when another guy puts another lock on your bike!

No, because you can do a double lock on a pole (each side) so long as no one puts their lock through your frame (usually they could pass it through your lock if they wanted).

But for this if someone has suspended their bike below yours you could never lower your bike.

I don't see the huge problem. Climb on the pole and take off your bike? Yeah it's inconvenient but somebody double locking your bike with a regular lock is far worse.

If climbing up the pole is as easy as you make it sound, this device is totally pointless.

Isn't it locked around the pole? Otherwise, depending on your age and weight, yes climbing up the pole is easy.

It's probably easier to climb the pole if there's a lower bike on the pole that you can grab on your way up.

I wonder how much weight the device can support? If you threw a weighted rope around a suspended bike and pulled on it, will you be able to lower it?

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