RSR

So my wife's 95 Honda Accord that she bought brand new straight out of high school was stolen out of her reserved covered parking space sometime between the afternoons of Jan 21 and Jan 22... It was secured, no keys in the car, and usually we have a masterlock club on it, but we were in a rush that day and forgot... But we work from home, so the car was usually there... And the door locks and club were the only security system we had on the car (and I insisted on the club, b/c I'm neurotic and figured making the car look secure would make it be less likely that someone would break in to steal the gps and stereo..., not b/c I thought someone would actually steal the entire car)... It hasn't yet been recovered, and since there was no broken glass, I have a feeling it was a professional thief that did it... The car is probably either parted out or in Mexico. And we haven't heard from insurance yet, but it's doubtful we'll get what it was worth (in our opinion much more than bluebook) and will most definitely have to spend more to have a vehicle in similar condition/reliability... So it sucks that even with good insurance settlement, we'll have at least $5k in unexpected expenses...

In retrospect, I REALLY wish that I would have known about some of the tracker technology that's really come down in price... Last I looked it was $500+ a year for lojack and the like... Looked after the theft, and that stuff has really come down in price.

Take the Spot Trace for instance. It runs off of GPS so works everywhere and tracks every 5 minutes. Cost for the device is $100 and $100 per year of tracking... Definitely would have been worth it -- 1) to recover the vehicle and 2) hopefully get the aholes that stole the car arrested.
http://www.findmespot.com/



So I got one, and in my Xtra cab, it had to be w/in 6 inches or so of a window for the spot to work, but I found a good location for it.

I have more layers of security on my truck than did my wife's car had but considering that you can't ever stop a determined thief, this addition brings a little more peace of mind after that theft...

Just wanted to put out a little public service announcement in the event you all want to ensure you're never forever w/o your current vehicle(s).

Related, I've been meaning to write a writeup on it, and I haven't. But there's this cool product called a SuperBumper.
It's awesome in 4 respects
1. It stops damage to your vehicle in the event of a rear-ending (it says 30mph or less on the site I believe)
2. Significantly reduces wiplash for those in your vehicle...
3. It sits at hitch level which means cars are less likely to go under your truck and/or ensure your first point of contact rear bumper is at other cars bumper level (you would back into their bumper if you're at fault rather than gouging a dent in a car's hood...).
4. It also works as a hitch step, and I was looking for a suitable one anyways.
And I believe I only paid ~$150 for it. This is the one I got: http://sparebumper.com/index.php?act...9&catId=6&mc=5

As you might know our trucks don't have crush zones, so bad accidents nearly always damage the frame which means insurance will total the vehicle and also not having crush zones, nearly all impact momentum gets transferred to the vehicle and folks in it...

Basically it has rubber pieces (I had to use the two main 2 rubber pieces and one shim on my truck) both outside and inside the hitch sort of like hockey puck type dense rubber that compact when receiving extreme force. The metal/pin groove on the hitch is cut such that you can tow with it (it connects like a standard hitch for forces that pull) but for forces that push there's a 2-3" slot in the hitch that allows for the metal to go into the hitch and the rubber to compress, reducing impact force to the vehicle. Also be sure to grease your hitch receive and the super bumper shaft on install so rust doesn't bind them together...

With all the idiots on their phones while driving these days, you don't want someone not paying attention to total your vehicle either...

dropzone

iTrader: (6)

Just a heads up a club takes about 6 seconds to defeat...

bswarm

An can of cheeze-wiz will unlock "the club".

scope103

Bummer, Ron.

While we all think the value of our trucks is very high, not so in the re-sale market. So it doesn't take much body damage to "total" one. As a practice, I don't carry Collision insurance on vehicles more than 3 years old, and I usually drop Comprehensive (the part that covers for theft) after about 4. (Of course I always carry Liability.) I'd be interested to hear what number your carrier comes up with.

All the films I've seen I've someone "removing" a "Club" by freezing it with aerosol have something like a 250lb weight lifter swinging a 3lb sledge hammer. If someone is willing to beat on your rig that hard (and damage it in the process), they can have it. Since a tow truck can remove anything, I think the whole purpose of a Club is to encourage the would-be thief to move on.

Odin

Sorry dude that sucks.

For some reason in Oregon these trucks are like gold. It seems like 99% of the sellers want 1,000 over Blue Book. If the seller has it reasonably priced it could go by the end of the first day.
On one truck I was the second caller with cash in my hand and lost out. The first caller offered the seller $100 over his asking price just to hold it for him. I called back later and the guy really did give him the extra money.

mountainbrew

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008FLOWAU..._PcK0ub05C9PHD This is the one I was thinking about getting. Pretty cheap, plus cheap "usage" cost. Not as convenient as lojack but it's so much less expensive

wyoming9

iTrader: (1)

I don`t own anything anyone would want then most often the keys are in the ignition .

Funny I always Have Comp insurance on every vehicle because it covers the glass.

I feel bad for your loss.

Nothing is ever theft proof at best you keep the honest from straying.

bswarm

I'm getting people knocking on my door every few months asking if my pickup is for sale. There must be something about older Toyotas that make them more desirable. I bought mine because they run forever with few problems. What sold me was a Toyota that came into my shop with 350k miles complaining about an oil leak, the timing chain wore through the cover, but was still running. I disable it if I'm not going to be using it for awhile, take the coil wire off, or battery, or ignition fuses. I tried making a phony coil wire out of vacuum hose once, it looked just like a real coil wire, terminals and boots included. It didn't work, the truck started with a vacuum hose as a coil wire.

RSR

I carry full insurance just b/c of the uninsured driver portion and for hail coverage -- there are a lot of illegal immigrants in Texas who do not carry insurance. That honda was rear ended 3 times since 1995 in the Dallas area (last was 7 or 8 years ago) and in NONE of those instances did the person rear-ending stop and when the license plates were ran by the cops in NONE of those instances were the cars have current registration or have insurance (insurance linked by license plate and searched by police/our insurance) and all appeared to be Hispanic. Not intending to hate on or disparage any race/ethnicity, but those are the facts at honestly as I know them... And Texas thunderstorms produce golf ball or larger sized hail at least once a year if you get caught out in it, you'll have bad body dents and cracked glass all over.

And on the value of my truck and that Honda, that extra was only $250 or so per year and gave a lot of extra collision/liability extra coverage too (I work for myself, so conceptually if my vehicle or me is involved in an accident w/o sufficient coverage and hurt someone I could lose everything, which simply isn't worth a couple hundred dollars per year...).

And yes, the goal of the club is/was a deterrent. I think about security in layers. I have more than 5 layers on my truck, starting with door locks and then in... All could be defeated, but it would take a determined thief some time to figure them all out. Any thieves that really want a vehicle will get it regardless of security measures... That seems to be the case w/ my wife's car. Almost always in the same spot and usually w/ the club on. This one day it was off b/c it was 3pm and hadn't eaten lunch yet so were rushing inside with some carryout and simply forgot the club in the backseat... So when someone is scoping out your car and waiting for an opportunity, eventually they'll have it and take it. It sucks, and that is the reality. You can't beat determined thiefs but you can beat opportunistic/happenstance ones. Which is why I think discreet trackers are a good add'l layer as most thieves don't have radio frequency trackers, etc (though I suppose the good ones do). And if you can't stop them from taking your stuff, it might help to get your stuff back and catch the jerks trying to take your things -- I detest stealing and want to see those who do it punished. I'd gladly pay a little money to achieve both recovery and prosecution. Also, if you think about recovery device like insurance, it makes sense to me in that respect too. If you get your truck back, you're getting back the full value of an item you own, not the full value someone else places on it.

The link you posted is for one of those ODBD2+ readers that plug into the vehicle's computer port. I believe our trucks and that honda just have odb1 readers on them that don't provide a lot of info or a lot of control. If you have odb1 readers, then yes, they're a good option -- BUT a pro thief would know to check your ODB port as a common place for those types of trackers...

Cars like that Honda and our Trucks will only go up in value -- they simply don't make them like they used to (with all the computers, electronics, and plastics modern cars are much more disposable than our generation of vehicles -- which are modern enough to be efficient and reliable but old enough to still be made of steel and other methods that put durability before weight and fuel efficiency and cost minimization, etc).
What we value them at and have in them will not be appreciated by anyone other than ourselves and similar enthusiast buyers. The folks that jack our vehicles either want to get them out of country down to Mexico or want them to put the parts from our well maintained vehicles into their beaters that they can't afford to maintain. I think it worked out that we spent about $200/month maintaining that Honda over the past 5 years... But we estimated needing half that over the next 5 due to a lot of the parts just being at end of life as the vehicle neared 200k miles (was at 210k when stolen) as well as being 20 years old which is when plastic, gaskets, and parts w/ them, etc, start to fail... Basically, we just completed the 200k service, did a tranny job a couple years ago (that's when we decided to get the rest of the vehicle like new and keep it for another 100k or until we have a baby in which case we'd sell to a family member that needed a car that we knew was in great condition), and the steering system was the only major component we hadn't done major work on (original rack and pinion and power steering pump but we did flush the ps fluid and replace the rack and pinion bellows and the TREs recently) and we even replaced the computer as the altimeter on the board had failed right after the tranny... I guess the back brakes and fuel pump would have come due eventually too as would some body touch up paint. But that's about it...

When we were maintaining the car, someone straight out stealing it was never a consideration for us and the economic choices we were making. Perhaps it should've been.

RSR

And the spot trace is about the size of a pack of cigarettes if that's helpful to know...

RSR

I really like the brake/clutch clubs as well.

But on my auto, you just have to hold a button towards the front of the tranny selector to change gears so it's relatively ineffective for me... Some sort of metal cage lock on the tranny selector arm might work though but would be ugly.

Maybe if I used one of those as a gas pedal lock...

The whole thing that sucks about this is that you shouldn't have to go to all this trouble to keep your stuff from being stolen...