Modern Outdoor Bike or Ebike Storage - very cool looking ...

[Deleted member 4210]

https://www.alpenstorage.com/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIoJ7d6Y2C4AIVRAKtBh1hQAsdEAEYASAAEgKOqvD_BwE

It locks. It anchors to ground. Can be placed in many different venues. Freeing up garage space at a home, or any number of public areas like parking garages, train platforms, businesses, etc.

 

[steve marino]

I like the clam shell design, but unless this was located in a secure place, one sledge hammer blow to the thing would probably either crack it open or bust it's lock. Note the rotomolded construction.....a fancy marketing word for molded plastic. Make it out of metal and they might have something.

Years ago I was walking down a San Francisco street and saw someone in a car taking the lock out of one of those beefy steel bars that locks onto your steering wheel to supposedly prevent car thefts. He saw me watching him and got out of the car and walked away. I walked over to the car and it looked like once you had the keyed lock out, which he had done, and which looked easy enough to do, you were home free.

 

[Deleted member 4210]

but unless this was located in a secure place, one sledge hammer blow to the thing would probably either crack it open

Doubt it. There are all kinds of 'plastics' these days that can EASILY resist any sledgehammer. In the 70's, I built an R/C car chassis out of Tuffak, and you could beat it with any hammer all you wanted, all day long, and it would not crack or break. It was only Only 3/8" thick. (trust me I won a lot of 'bets' with buddies who would try to break some spare pieces I kept around).

And there are plastics that simply 'absorb' bullets, such as polymer nanofibers, stronger than Kevlar (often used for body armor). (The polymer nanofibers are made up of strands of polyvinylidene fluoride spun with polyvinvylidene fluoride trifluoroethylene and twisted into 'yarn') Kevlar can absorb as much as 80 joules of energy force per gram before breaking, but this new fiber is capable of withstanding up 98 KILO-joules per gram.

And so obviously, they've come a LONG way since the 70's with all sorts of 'plastics' formulations (with many other names that are barely pronounceable) , so I would be very careful to simply 'assume' that just because its a form of plastic, that you could readily 'break' through it. The website doesn't say what it is, other than to say its 'secure.' Use of metals is pretty old school actually for something like this.

 

[erider_61]

@Deleted Member 4210 Actually they do say what it's made of. Polyethylene plastic which is the most common plastic produced. Used in everything from saran wrap to grocercy bags, pop bottles etc. So yeah a sledge hammer or even a well placed kick is going to crack it.

 

[6zfshdb]

An interesting design but not very secure. Would work as a weatherproof storage solution in low crime areas though. One thing it has going for it is, would be thieves won't know what is actually inside. Many don't care and would break in anyway but the enclosure may deter discriminating thieves looking for specific high end bikes.

 

[erider_61]

Maybe attaching a sign like this could help...

 

[Deleted member 4210]

@Deleted Member 4210 Actually they do say what it's made of. Polyethylene plastic which is the most common plastic produced. Used in everything from saran wrap to grocercy bags, pop bottles etc. So yeah a sledge hammer or even a well placed kick is going to crack it.

Dude - there are all sorts of polyethelenes... do some homework before you guess like you are doing here. You are likely confusing the term with polypropylene, which is used for house wares appliances, sheds, and toys. Polyethelenes can produced to be many combinations of low density, high density, or high density molecular weights, and even spun into fibers that are woven into high tensile strength materials many times stronger than steel. Also used in bullet proof vests. As they mention it, it's just likely a generic term, not spelling out the full molecular structure.

 

[erider_61]

Dude - there are all sorts of polyethelenes... do some homework before you guess like you are doing here. You are likely confusing the term with polypropylene, which is used for house wares appliances, sheds, and toys. Polyethelenes can produced to be many combinations of low density, high density, or high density molecular weights, and even spun into fibers that are woven into high tensile strength materials many times stronger than steel. Also used in bullet proof vests. As they mention it, it's just likely a generic term, not spelling out the full molecular structure.

Dude...Do your homework and read the FAQ section of your very own link like I did before you get confused and accuse me of guessing. I took chemical engineering in college and am very well aware of the myriad of polyethylene configurations...

Q: What material is the Bike Capsule made of?

A: Alpen Bike Capsules are made from nearly indestructible LLDPE plastic-similar to kayaks and Yeti coolers. All components and hardware are rustproof aluminum and stainless steel.

Oh...And if you want to believe LLDPE is indestructible I suggest you do some additional homework
http://www.primepolymer.co.jp/english/technology/material/pe/05.html

 

[Deleted member 4210]

Dude...Do your homework and read the FAQ section of your very own link like I did before you get confused and accuse me of guessing. I took chemical engineering in college and am very well aware of the myriad of polyethylene configurations...

Q: What material is the Bike Capsule made of?

A: Alpen Bike Capsules are made from nearly indestructible LLDPE plastic-similar to kayaks and Yeti coolers. All components and hardware are rustproof aluminum and stainless steel.

Oh...And if you want to believe LLDPE is indestructible I suggest you do some additional homework
http://www.primepolymer.co.jp/english/technology/material/pe/05.html

So what were you trying to prove ? you are the one who said it would be easy to kick in with a well placed kick, implying it was cheap plastic. So you just now contradicted your first email, with their answer,, as every Kayak I've been around there is no one who is going to put their foot through that, and if they tried they'd be in a hospital getting that foot put into a cast. Now you are trying to contend that a kayak is not indestructible? Ok. You win. I give. But please Send us that video of yourself putting your foot through a kayak. It'll be interesting to say the least.

 

[erider_61]

@Deleted Member 4210 They say similar to kayaks. If you look at the tensile strength of LLDPE plastic in the link I provided you will see the tensile impact MPa numbers vary from a low of 25 to a high of 140 depending on the molecular weight. MPa can be converted to a PSI rating which most of us are familiar with. This would represent the PSI "pounds per square inch" of impact force to break the plastic. Using the converter here http://convertmpatopsi.com/ 25 MPa =3,770 PSI. For comparison hot rolled steel has an MPa of 350=51,000 PSI

I very much doubt the Alpen Bike Capsule is anywhere near as thick as a kayak and will succumb to a sledgehammer blow. I will retract the well placed kick however...lol

 

[Jerry LM]

WOW! what kind of neighborhoods???? people walking around with sledge hammers and kicking in stuff? must be rough territory, I think I would be moving along with my bike in areas like those........

 

[6zfshdb]

I wonder if a pair of these could be mounted to a pickup truck bed slide. It would be a great way to protect the bikes from the elements while transporting.

 

[Jerry LM]

Or on the back carry platform on the rv! don't know what the dimension are.

 

[SirJonathan]

This is interesting. We park both our cars in the garage. It's a 2.5 car garage and that extra half of a space is filled with - stuff. This includes 5 bikes and it's a pain to jockey them around. We don't hang them from the ceiling but have looked into that.

A couple of these would be really interesting to place on the side of our house. My concern is heat in the summer. There are days when it's 100F and during summer almost always around 90F. I would imagine those things become mini ovens in the heat and eBike components don't like extremes.

Other than that I think they are a very interesting product.

EDIT: Whoa! It's $900. Ok, my garage is just fine.

 

[indianajo]

WOW! what kind of neighborhoods???? people walking around with sledge hammers and kicking in stuff? must be rough territory, I think I would be moving along with my bike in areas like those........

Like my neighborhood? The thieves knocked the man door frame out of my garage with a sledgehammer. Were loading my riding mower in the pickup when my neighbor walked over. I saw the spotter the Saturday afternoon before when I was welding in the driveway - an old man in a van labled for some resale shop giving me the full eyeball.
I could buy a dozen e-bikes with the money I've saved by paying only $850 a year in real estate taxes. I have city sewers & piped natural gas, which most exurbanites further out do not. I save $100 a month by having a roof antenna for TV banned in most fancy developments. My outdoor clothesline is similarly banned by deed restrictions most "communities", which saves about 20 KWH a month because I don't use a dryer.
As far as good neighborhoods, the guy that owned Weldrite lived in High Tax Heights. The thieves cut through his garage roof with a gas saw before taking out the welders through the roof.

 

[erider_61]

WOW! what kind of neighborhoods???? people walking around with sledge hammers and kicking in stuff? must be rough territory, I think I would be moving along with my bike in areas like those........

Lets just say you don't wander around after dark here...

 

[erider_61]

Or on the back carry platform on the rv! don't know what the dimension are.

From the FAQ section... 79"longx32"widex53"tall

 

[erider_61]

EDIT: Whoa! It's $900. Ok, my garage is just fine.

Plus $200 shipping...

 

[6zfshdb]

Most expensive piece of "Tupperware" I ever saw!

The heck with the bike, the thieves are going to steal the enclosure!

 

[Jerry LM]

Good Point, need a storage lockup for the storage you need to cover your bike with extra sledge proof door! by the time you get to the bike your to tired to ride.