Kryptonite Kryptodisc Lock

KRYPTONITE KRYPTODISC LOCK

CW EVALUATION

Motorcycling's answer to The Club

HERE'S ONE OF LIFE'S UGLY BUT IMmutable facts: If a professional thief wants your bike badly enough, he's going to get it. All you can hope to do, really, is keep it out of the hands of amateurs and joyriders. Even if you've rigged your garage with an impenetrable security system involving high-tech alarms, bulletproof locks and a pack of starving Rottweilers, you can't take it along with you.

Indeed, since most motorcycles have very limited cargo capacity, portability is paramount when it comes to antitheft equipment. And one of the most easily transportable theft-deterrents currently available is Kryptonite’s (320 Turnpike St., Canton, MA 02021; 617/828-6655) KryptoDisc Lock. It’s a one-pound security device that deters roll-away and ride-away theft by preventing one of a bike’s brake discs from rotating past its caliper. Its small size (3'/2 inches long, 1 inch wide, 2 inches thick) makes it easy to stuff'into a jacket pocket, and somehow, somewhere, it can be toted along on most bikes-in a tool compartment, under the seat, even latched around the seat strap.

The forged-steel KryptoDisc is made in a very narrow U-shape incorporating a key-operated locking pin that slides across the open end of the U. You install it by slipping it over one of your bike’s brake discs until your thumb or forefinger can push the locking pin through any convenient hole or slot in the brake-rotor assembly. Once the pin engages a hole in the other side of the U-groove, it locks into place, securing the KryptoDisc on the rotor. To remove it, simply unlock it with its cylindrical key, allowing the spring-loaded locking pin to retract out of the U-groove.

Sound quick and easy? It is. Installation or removal takes all of about 3 seconds on most bikes; and on nondisc-brake motorcycles with chain drive, you usually can attach the Lock to the rear sprocket.

Although the KryptoDisc is casehardened to prevent its being sawed in half, we were able to break our test Lock in less than 30 seconds with a couple of common hand tools (wc aren’t going to tell you, or any wellread thieves out there, how we did it); but remember, this is only a deterrent, not a fail-safe anti-theft device. Besides, the extra half-minute it takes to defeat the KryptoDisc-along with all the noise a thief will make in the process-is a deterrent in itself.

You also must remember that the Lock is on the disc before you try to ride away; a crash and/or damaged brake components are inevitable if you forget. To help you remember, the KryptoDisc is painted a bright, neon orange that catches your eye-and, hopefully, that of a potential thief-as you approach the bike.

So, even if it isn’t infallible, the $35 KryptoDisc is cheap, relatively effective insurance that’s easy to use, convenient to carry and available at most motorcycle shops.

And, unlike the Rottweilers, you don’t have to feed it. □