[Jaggu]

Originally Posted by psankar

A network of puncture shops in the outer ring road, Bangalore is intentionally putting nails on the roads.

My brother lives in this area and i can confidently vouch for this situation. Both his cars manages to catch a nail or two every other month! I was attributing to the construction that was happening in ORR for this, but that has got completed long back. Still the punctures continue!

[Samurai]

Tube tyre cars are most vulnerable to this mad business practice. These kind of nails can't burst a tubeless right away. You can get it fixed at your own time.

[mpksuhas]

Originally Posted by psankar

A network of puncture shops in the outer ring road, Bangalore is intentionally putting nails on the roads.

Is this still ongoing ?
I had read an article on this few months back in paper, thought they would have stopped by now.

News link

[RSR]

I wouldn't put it beyond these fly-by-night "puncture shop" operators to deliberately perform nasty tricks like these to improve their business.

It's true that these scamsters may not benefit much from tubeless tyres found on almost all new cars these days. The majority of their victims would be those that use tube-type tyres - most commuter motorcycles & scooters, older cars, autorickshaws and commercial vehicles of most types. Two-wheelers are particularly vulnerable - they would be stranded with a punctured tyre as they don't carry a spare.

Tubeless tyres may not deflate immediately upon collecting a nail, and the driver/rider may not even need to stop the vehicle. Still, if a tubeless tyre gets punctured too many times, it may play on the mind of the driver/rider. So it's in the best interests of everyone to join hands to stop these scamsters.

A good, unlikely ally would be the local unit of the state transport corporation. I remember that Chennai's MTC found out that most of their breakdowns were happening due to punctured tyres. Punctured tyres not only taxed the breakdown unit of the MTC heavily, they also caused traffic snarls on busy roads during rush hour.

The solution? The MTC got a truck-mounted magnetic sweeper and put it to good use on the main bus routes. It was like a local version of this thing:



They managed to bring down the puncture rate of MTC buses quite remarkably. I remember reading in an old news article that the MTC's magnetic sweeper would collect kilos of ferrous metal during a typical week of deployment on bus routes (not all of it may have been sharp tyre threatening objects though).

Of course, it's not perfect. Non-magnetic metal objects cannot and would not be picked up by the powerful truck-mounted magnet. And the sweeper cannot sweep the entire road, as it was run like a typical bus service. Yet, it was a big boon for both the MTC and all other road users as well, especially two-wheeler riders. I don't know if the thing is still in operation now.

[Chetan_Rao]

^^^ Makes a lot of sense, something like an overnight/off-hours sweep of the busiest city roads to avoid puncture-related breakdowns and consequent traffic snarls during peak hours. As to what should be done to the morons planting these sharp objects, I'd rather not voice my opinion.

[ajmat]

Originally Posted by Samurai

Tube tyre cars are most vulnerable to this mad business practice. These kind of nails can't burst a tubeless right away. You can get it fixed at your own time.

Yes, but we end up as delayed collateral damage. I have a tyre with 6 punctures due to this road

[RSR]

It looks like the MTC's magnetic collector was successful enough to inspire units in other cities of Tamil Nadu. It's much simpler than I thought - just a powerful magnet (electro-magnet?) mounted low at the front of a maintenance vehicle. Here is the Coimbatore version:



Source: https://tnstc.wordpress.com/2011/11/...d-with-magnet/

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

Makes a lot of sense, something like an overnight/off-hours sweep of the busiest city roads to avoid puncture-related breakdowns and consequent traffic snarls during peak hours.

That's a great point. The transport corporations should collaborate with the city corporations and municipalities and offer to fit these powerful magnets on their trucks (waste collectors, road sweepers, plant watering trucks, street lamp maintenance lift-trucks etc.) These trucks do far more rounds of more roads and streets everyday and would be very effective when used together with the transport corporation's own vehicles. It may be a difficult task to get different government departments to work together, but the end result would be a win-win situation for everyone (except the idiots strewing nails on the road themselves).

[apachelongbow]

Good initiative with the magnets!! Also when we identify the area where nails or sharp objects are being thrown, if its near a tyre repair shop, just raid the shop and close it down, and publicize it widely. When word gets around that livelihoods are lost, the greedy morons would stop throwing nails around.

[john.gt]

There was an article about a techie who started combing for nails in the Silk board - Ecospace corridor, Benedict Jebakumar.

Some of the articles which appeared in media recently and a while back

200-days-off-puncturing-scam

Techies-Gandhigiri-chronicles-narrate-a-nail-biting-adventure

[raghu.t.k]

Originally Posted by RSR

It looks like the MTC's magnetic collector was successful enough to inspire units in other cities of Tamil Nadu. It's much simpler than I thought - just a powerful magnet (electro-magnet?) mounted low at the front of a maintenance vehicle. Here is the Coimbatore version:
......
......
That's a great point. The transport corporations should collaborate with the city corporations and municipalities and offer to fit these powerful magnets on their trucks (waste collectors, road sweepers, plant watering trucks, street lamp maintenance lift-trucks etc.) These trucks do far more rounds of more roads and streets everyday and would be very effective when used together with the transport corporation's own vehicles.
...

Why dont they put on their own buses, instead of having a seperate vehicle. Probably a couple of buses in every depot, for every route. That way there would be a minimum of 2 -3 sweeps every day.

[Samurai]

The nail bandit has been caught. Great effort by Bangalore City Police.

https://www.facebook.com/blrcitypoli...50938024940961

[aghate]

A couple of months back I had read about incidents in Wakdewadi (Pune), the area near Yamaha showroom, that some guys come beside your car and will tell you that the tyre pressure is less in one of the tyres. Unsurprisingly, you pull up at the next puncture repair stall which is couple of meters away. There, some other guys will engage you in a conversation and the puncture repairing person will bore holes in your tyre and will slap a bill of 1000 bucks or more as a repair fee. You pay the hefty bill and plus you get your car a new tyre which costs thousands of bucks more due to the intense damage.

The same incident occurred today at around 9:00 pm when I was returning home with my Mom. Two guys on a white Activa came to the left of my car and told my Mom that the pressure is less in the front left tyre. She then told me about what the guys were saying. Fortunately, I having a good memory even in this Tech Savvy world told them to buzz out. Reached home and checked the tyre again and I was not surprised to see it in a good nick. There are ways where you can find it out yourself while driving but that is not the motto of this post.

The thing that surprises me is that these guys are still actively doing this crime without any fear. There will be someone who will be fooled by them. Please be aware of these incidents and update your friends/relatives about it.


Thanks!

[tazmaan]

Originally Posted by aghate

A couple of months back I had read about incidents in Wakdewadi (Pune), the area near Yamaha showroom, that some guys come beside your car and will tell you that the tyre pressure is less in one of the tyres. Unsurprisingly, you pull up at the next puncture repair stall which is couple of meters away. There, some other guys will engage you in a conversation and the puncture repairing person will bore holes in your tyre and will slap a bill of 1000 bucks or more as a repair fee. You pay the hefty bill and plus you get your car a new tyre which costs thousands of bucks more due to the intense damage.

The same incident occurred today at around 9:00 pm when I was returning home with my Mom. Two guys on a white Activa came to the left of my car and told my Mom that the pressure is less in the front left tyre. She then told me about what the guys were saying. Fortunately, I having a good memory even in this Tech Savvy world told them to buzz out. Reached home and checked the tyre again and I was not surprised to see it in a good nick. There are ways where you can find it out yourself while driving but that is not the motto of this post.

The thing that surprises me is that these guys are still actively doing this crime without any fear. There will be someone who will be fooled by them. Please be aware of these incidents and update your friends/relatives about it.


Thanks!

This exact same thing happened with me while traveling to Mahableshwar few months back on the highway post Hinjewadi. I was in a new Jazz along with my 3 years old son and pregnant wife. I simply refused to stop, but the two people on bike followed me for a good 5 mins signaling at my tires. They were pointing at the front tyre and I was sure nothing was wrong with it since there were no vibrations at speed of 50kmph. I gestured the guys that ill call some one if they followed me further showing them my phone. They immediately stopped following us.

One day I hope to nab such people if I am traveling with a gang of guys

[aghate]

Originally Posted by tazmaan

This exact same thing happened with me while traveling to Mahableshwar few months back on the highway post Hinjewadi. I was in a new Jazz along with my 3 years old son and pregnant wife. I simply refused to stop, but the two people on bike followed me for a good 5 mins signaling at my tires. They were pointing at the front tyre and I was sure nothing was wrong with it since there were no vibrations at speed of 50kmph. I gestured the guys that ill call some one if they followed me further showing them my phone. They immediately stopped following us.

One day I hope to nab such people if I am traveling with a gang of guys

These incidents seem to be happening everywhere in Pune and areas outside. I shared this stuff on Facebook and boy oh boy so many people responded about this happening in different areas. I hope to nab them as well. It is just that we all need to be aware.

[darklord]

Bengaluru techie collects 37kgs of nails from roads to help motorists

Bengaluru: Benedict Jebakumar, a systems engineer working in Bengaluru, has collected over 37 kgs of nails scattered along roads, most of them deliberately planted by nearby puncture shops to benefit their business.

http://www.deccanchronicle.com/natio...motorists.html