Before being thrust into adulthood, I used to ride my bike everywhere; it was one of my favorite things to do. Although I haven’t ridden a bike in years, my children are at the age where they are learning how to ride bikes. I love the idea of taking family bike rides and am exploring the idea of purchasing myself a bike.
If I am going to participate in these family rides, I want to make sure our bikes are protected from theft. With that in mind, I recently discovered a very interesting bike lock on Kickstarter, the I Lock It.
The I Lock It, is a Bluetooth smart-lock you attach to your bike’s frame. It works by automatically sliding a stainless steel bolt through your rear wheel when you walk away from the bike. This immobilizes the bike, deterring potential thieves. When you return to your bike, the I Lock It automatically unlocks.
Since the I Lock It doesn’t attach the bike to any structure, I was wondering what would prevent a thief from taking the bike and cutting the lock later.
Well, the device has a sensor that sounds a 110 dB alarm if anyone tampers with the lock or lifts the bike. Plus, if you’re within 330 feet of the lock, it will send your phone a notification that it’s being tampered with.
I next wondered what would happen if your phone died before you unlocked the bike.
I Lock It has you covered; you can unlock the device by entering a pin code on it or you can purchase a key fob to lock and unlock your bike.
I Lock It has several additional features you can explore on its Kickstarter project page. The lock can be purchased for $101, but it isn’t estimated to ship until next January.
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It failed miserably on shark tank.
the lock on shark tank was a different one, which does not lock automatically
What are the chances of it locking while riding?
100% when your phone loses its Bluetooth signal ?
I don’t know exactly how it works, but I have to assume there is protection against it locking while you ride. I imagine it works using Bluetooth signal strength instead of just simply connection/no connection. I would bet it only locks when it gradually detects signal strength decrease.
Hey everyone,
as one of the founders of I LOCK IT I’m happy to answer your questions.
If you’re battery dies or the Bluetooth connection gets lost during riding nothing will happen. I LOCK IT uses different sensor to detect the motion of your bike. This prevents it from locking while your riding. When you come to a stop I LOCK IT will give you an accoustic signal to let you know, that the Bluetooth signal is lost.
To lock and unlock we use the strength of the signal since the Bluetooth range is much further then the distance at which it should lock.
I hope this answers your questions. We are happy about any support for our Kickstarter campaign.
Markus
Markus, awesome for checking in to support your product. From my perspective this lock is awesome, looks great and the combo lock and alarm is a stellar build. As with many people i am nervous about putting something like this on my bike. I would be way more comfortable with a manual lock (press and click and walk away) and then a bluetooth unlock. Lack of a perfect failsafe would be a dealbreaker for me. Just the thought that there could be any possibility of a bar being pushed into my spokes while i rode would make me look elsewhere. Just my two cents!
Hi Kenny,
thank you for your feedback. I can understand your concerns, that’s why this also has our highest priority while developing and testing our lock. There is also the option to disable automatic locking. This way you have to press the button on the lock to lock your bike. You can combine this with automatic unlocking. Only downside is that if you walk past your bike it would unlock automatically without locking again. So your bike could be unlocked without you noticing.
Hi Markus.
I would like ask you that when I want fixet this I LOCK IT on bike I use only two screw and what secure this screw against unfixing.(allow the screw).
Thank you . Paul.
Hi Paul,
when removing the screws the alarm will go off because of the motion plus I LOCK IT can’t be removed from your bike because of the metal bar that locks it to your wheel. Of course you can also use specials screws which can only be opened by a special screwdriver.
Markus