Vikramaditya
Knowledge spongee
So last night around 12:45 a friend and I were taking it easy at my place after a long day of studying and other shit. It just so happened that I was sitting next to my patio door, and at a certain point I heard an odd noise that was a combination of an engine loudly revving and the belt of a transmission whining. Seeing as I live in Berkeley, I hear odd noises regularly and my first reaction was to pay no attention to it. For some reason, however, I felt the urge to go out to my balcony and check on my bike. I usually keep it inside our parking garage in my roommates parking spot (he never parks there because he's a consultant and travels 6 days of every week) but he was back home last night so I had to keep my bike out on the street.
From here on everything is a little blurry as it happened extremely fast, but I essentially saw a man with a medium to heavy build wearing blue jeans and a white t-shirt crouching next to my baby with his hands underneath it. I ran inside and yelled to my friend that someone was trying to jack my bike and we needed to get the fuck downstairs ASAP. We took the elevator down and he called the cops on the way. By the time we got outside the guy was gone. I have no idea whether he was having difficulty stealing it/whatever he was doing and decided to peace or if he heard me yell to my friend as I came inside.
When I got to the bike it smelled like gas/burning, and the side mirror was pushed in. The back tailight (not the indicator, the one on the very back) was broken, and the back left side is also somewhat scratched a bit in places. It's a Ninja 250 and on the back, slightly below where the seat ends there are little covers that contain the screws for the plastics. The covers were flipped up but it doesn't look like the screws were taken off. I tried starting the bike and while the engine would turn the bike wouldn't start. The cops never came and I ended up parking the bike in front of my roommates car against the wall in our garage.
Thankfully, I tried to start the bike this afternoon and it did indeed start, although I have no idea if there is other internal damage or things I am unfamiliar with (its my first bike, and I've had it for less than three months).
Given my limited knowledge of mechanics and common themes in motorcycle theft, I talked to a few friends who also ride.
In total, we were able to come up with three main hypotheses.
1) They were trying to hot wire the bike. This makes sense because of the smell and the noise I heard. It also might relate to why the bike wouldn't start last night, but if they cut the wires or whatever I have no idea why it would start now. The forks of the bike were locked as well, so I'm not sure what purpose hot wiring the bike would have.
2) They were trying to pick the bike up and move it. The sound and smell could've been from the truck pulling the bike, and the bike could've dropped during the process causing the broken tailight and pushed in mirror. Or perhaps they could've broken when they were strapping the bike up. My friend also said he saw a truck with a trailer on an adjacent street as we got onto the street, but that could've been a coincidence.
3) They were just trying to steal the plastics. This wouldn't explain the sound I heard or the smell, but it would explain why the screw covers were flipped up. It would also explain why he might've been willing to leave so quickly and why I didn't see a truck when I looked outside (although I didn't take the time to look around the street).
That's the best that I could come up with. Anyone have any thoughts? Any recommendations on things I can do to make sure the bike is safe to ride?
From here on everything is a little blurry as it happened extremely fast, but I essentially saw a man with a medium to heavy build wearing blue jeans and a white t-shirt crouching next to my baby with his hands underneath it. I ran inside and yelled to my friend that someone was trying to jack my bike and we needed to get the fuck downstairs ASAP. We took the elevator down and he called the cops on the way. By the time we got outside the guy was gone. I have no idea whether he was having difficulty stealing it/whatever he was doing and decided to peace or if he heard me yell to my friend as I came inside.
When I got to the bike it smelled like gas/burning, and the side mirror was pushed in. The back tailight (not the indicator, the one on the very back) was broken, and the back left side is also somewhat scratched a bit in places. It's a Ninja 250 and on the back, slightly below where the seat ends there are little covers that contain the screws for the plastics. The covers were flipped up but it doesn't look like the screws were taken off. I tried starting the bike and while the engine would turn the bike wouldn't start. The cops never came and I ended up parking the bike in front of my roommates car against the wall in our garage.
Thankfully, I tried to start the bike this afternoon and it did indeed start, although I have no idea if there is other internal damage or things I am unfamiliar with (its my first bike, and I've had it for less than three months).
Given my limited knowledge of mechanics and common themes in motorcycle theft, I talked to a few friends who also ride.
In total, we were able to come up with three main hypotheses.
1) They were trying to hot wire the bike. This makes sense because of the smell and the noise I heard. It also might relate to why the bike wouldn't start last night, but if they cut the wires or whatever I have no idea why it would start now. The forks of the bike were locked as well, so I'm not sure what purpose hot wiring the bike would have.
2) They were trying to pick the bike up and move it. The sound and smell could've been from the truck pulling the bike, and the bike could've dropped during the process causing the broken tailight and pushed in mirror. Or perhaps they could've broken when they were strapping the bike up. My friend also said he saw a truck with a trailer on an adjacent street as we got onto the street, but that could've been a coincidence.
3) They were just trying to steal the plastics. This wouldn't explain the sound I heard or the smell, but it would explain why the screw covers were flipped up. It would also explain why he might've been willing to leave so quickly and why I didn't see a truck when I looked outside (although I didn't take the time to look around the street).
That's the best that I could come up with. Anyone have any thoughts? Any recommendations on things I can do to make sure the bike is safe to ride?
glad you got to nip that ROBBERY or THEFT.. 
Hey, no using my name...............
is for
