New Steel

[BikeGary]

The folks that make the Ti Mini lock have a kickstarted project for a steel version.

Who knows whether it will rust, high carbon steel is known to rust vs Ti but they claim it's tougher.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tigrlock/tigr-blue-high-carbon-steel-strong-and-light-bike-lock

They are electro painting the lock to avoid rust. So if you live in Seattle/Portland and ride regularly in the rain you may want the Ti Version.

 

[benphyr]

And UV protected vinyl coated to protect your frame. If you are getting one (or a similar purpose / cost lock) anyway and can wait until May... the kick starter price is $90+shipping which is way below retail of $135. It is kickstarter but a reliable, good company.

 

[BikeGary]

Anyone funding a kickstarter project needs to realize that this is not a "purchase" but you are funding a project that in all probability will be late and has a possibility that it will go wonky and either never ship (one project I funded the founder died.) or be years late. Many projects are under funded and when it comes time to ship, they don't have the cash. I have paid extra for the final shipping a couple of times.

But you can have pride in a project, and sometimes it is less than the retail price in the end.

In this case, because this company is making a variant on an existing project and has done Kickstarter projects before, it's less likely to go off the rails. But that's my guess. YMMV.

 

[benphyr]

Not all go bad, late, or ??
Didn’t a certain company we know have a kickstarter campaign to introduce the T50?

 

[BikeGary]

I've backed 25 projects that got enough funding to exist.
1 failed spectacularly with the death of the founder. The good news is that the company got bailed out by a wealthy backer who didn't want the business to fail. They went through bankruptcy cleared their debts and are back in business. As a funder, I got nothing. But I'm glad the company is in business, and I have bought stuff from them since.
1 movie reward was delayed 7 years. But I did finally get the DVD
1 set of bicycle fenders was screwed over by their manufacturer who replaced a critical Aluminum part with a plastic bit and is awaiting future funding to make that part.
2 projects turned out to be not all that useful. (Fly Pedals, they clip into a cleated pedal and give you a flat surface, but the pedal rotates downward due to the weight and it makes them hard to ride on.)
1 phone charger which runs off a 9v battery which I never use.


And several projects that exceeded my expectations. A razor for shaving https://getrockwell.com/ (I like this razor enough that I bought several as gifts) , a couple of bicycle lights from https://beryl.cc/ The tail light and the bicycle laser.. The coolest GPS speedometer ever... https://omata.com/ (expensive but boy does it look cool on my S30!) and a bunch of other stuff which I like but aren't worth mentioning here.

 

[Mathew Fy]

I got a TiGr lock from Kickstarter a couple years ago. It was a titanium one shaped like the steel one being offered now, and I was able to have the lock cylinder keyed to an older model I had. They delivered about eleven months after funding. The “D” shape of this lock is a like the one Cruzbike sells.
See a post about the TiGr lock Cruzbike used to sell.
Cruzbike came through on their T50 in a timely fashion, as did some others, but I’m still waiting over four years for a different project. If the company fails to deliver, a refund is mandated by Kickstarter.

 

[BikeGary]

"If the company fails to deliver, a refund is mandated by Kickstarter."
I don't think this is true. If the project isn't fully funded, then yeah you get your pledge back. But the disaster projects I've been apart of spent all their money on the project, engineering, manufacturing, tooling etc. There was no money to give back. That was the reason cited by the founder who took his own life over it. Which most of the backers felt terrible about.