And another new way to nick your car...
- Thread starter Uther
- Start date
So, trying not to sound suspicious here, but am genuinely interested, how do you sell a stolen car these days? Are they exported? I can't imagine they'd be sold for parts? If used in the UK, what number plate do they use? Just one from an equivalent car? Are our traffic monitoring systems not good enough to spot trends of two cars being used in different parts of the country at the same time?
russia/ukraine etc usually
easier to sell. Parting out is a thing too but parts don't get sold here either. When you look at prices of some of the new car parts it is pretty crazy!
It's standard equipment on a lot of cars now FYI.
It's a question of security vs convenience. A bit like contactless pay on credit cards, for example.
The consideration is: is it worth the risk? After all, the loss is primarily reflected in general insurance premiums. Most of the insurance cost is not related to car thefts - in fact it's probably a very minor element these days. Therefore if thefts double (say) then the impact on insurance premiums may not be that much.
I really like my keyless entry from a convenience point of view. Would I pay another £100 a year (say) for the added insurance premium cost? Perhaps I would, I dont know.
Worth thinking about though.
I always find those considerations interesting. Would I pay someone 20p every time I walked to my car just to save the hassle of putting my hand in my pocket? I'd say of course not, but then after having keyless entry for 8 years I also know how much I love it and I would definitely look at the price of it on the next car. So i guess i am happy to hand over the money.
Not tried a box but my keyless entry won't work if the fob is shielded by my phone in my pocket (Ie the fob and phone are in the same pocket with the fob behind the phone. Looks pretty trick when I unlock my car by taking my phone out of my pocket though
I tried it and even right next to the door it wouldn't open. Tin foil works too (you can line a box or key holder etc with it). But it's not as easy to seal it completely and signal might escape
But yea, depending on the quality of the signal booster you could in theory go make it go any distance. Some of the equipment the military use can extend a wifi router's signal for miles.
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I find this baffling. Such a minimal reduction of effort and, in exchange, you get a far more insecure system. Great trade-off, not.
Nothing like mass hysteria is there.
It appears you may not have lived with keyless entry. It's not a 'minimal' reduction of effort at all. It's a fantastic system, convenience wise.
I suppose you dont like remote central locking either. So much better to have to put a key in the door, unlock it, then get in and reach over and unlock the other doors. The amount of effort involved is so little, who would ever bother with remote central locking! The risk that someone could clone your key by standing near you (for example) is oh so high. Le'ts hope that technology never catches on eh?!
It's not something I care about really. It's one of the reasons I pay for insurance.
If someone wants to nick your car, they're going to nick it.
I guess all the worried people don't have things like electric garage doors either? Maybe I should join in with the mass hysteria and swap mine out to just have a padlock on it instead!
If someone wants to nick your car, they're going to nick it.
I guess all the worried people don't have things like electric garage doors either? Maybe I should join in with the mass hysteria and swap mine out to just have a padlock on it instead!
You put your keys in the same pocket as your phone? What is wrong with you!Not tried a box but my keyless entry won't work if the fob is shielded by my phone in my pocket (Ie the fob and phone are in the same pocket with the fob behind the phone. Looks pretty trick when I unlock my car by taking my phone out of my pocket though
Wondered who'd pipe up with the tired old "if you've never had it, you can't know" rubbish.
It's a minor convenience which offers very little benefit over traditional remote central locking. I don't need to "live with it" to understand what it offers and realise that I don't want or need it, hence why I didn't add it to my next car.
From what I can tell, it saves a tiny bit of effort in that you no longer have to physically remove a key from your pocket and press a button and swaps the action of inserting and twisting a key with pressing a button.
Wow! These actions have all become automatic muscle memory for anyone who drives a car regularly and you do them without thinking anyway. In exchange for these minor benefits we get reduced security due to the nature of the system.
Remote central locking offers a massive benefit over no central locking at all and still more of a benefit over manual central locking than does keyless over it.
Unless I'm completely wrong and there are some other benefits to keyless of which I'm unaware?
Well it's clearly obvious from that that you've never had a car with it. It's brilliant, almost as though the car key ceases to exist you don't ever need to think about it. It's one of those thing where once you've had it you definitely wouldn't want to go back to an old fashioned key.
Same old rubbish. You can't actually come up with any tangible benefits other than the two marginal ones I mentioned, so you just keep spouting the "you don't know because you've never had it" rhetoric
I don't think about my key anyway, as I said its use becomes a totally automatic and almost subconscious action, thus rendering the benefits of keyless very marginal.
You contend I don't know different because I've not had it, well I could just as easily claim that you're blinkered because you do have it and are trying to convince yourself it's more of a benefit than it really is whilst conveniently ignoring the security issues it adds.
Well, there is no REAL benefit to "keyless", it's purely a gimmick. But it's a gimmick which breaks security, so I'd rather cars went back to the old coded key system which was far stronger.
Car security has become so weak that people are having to go back to using steering wheel locks. Something people last did in the early 90s. The relay thing isn't the only way people are stealing modern cars either. A big part of the issue is EU rules that say the ECU has to be accessible using genetic tools, which anyone can get hold of. That makes it easy for a hacker to whip up software to create keys and bypass the security.
Car security has become so weak that people are having to go back to using steering wheel locks. Something people last did in the early 90s. The relay thing isn't the only way people are stealing modern cars either. A big part of the issue is EU rules that say the ECU has to be accessible using genetic tools, which anyone can get hold of. That makes it easy for a hacker to whip up software to create keys and bypass the security.
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Same old rubbish. You can't actually come up with any tangible benefits other than the two marginal ones I mentioned, so you just keep spouting the "you don't know because you've never had it" rhetoric
I don't think about my key anyway, as I said its use becomes a totally automatic and almost subconscious action, thus rendering the benefits of keyless very marginal.
You contend I don't know different because I've not had it, well I could just as easily claim that you're blinkered because you do have it and are trying to convince yourself it's more of a benefit than it really is whilst conveniently ignoring the security issues it adds.
I'm fine with ignoring the security issues, I don't keep the keys by the door, nobody wants to steal old Toyotas, and if they do then insurance will deal with it. Is the added convenience worth it? Yes absolutely, it's not a gimmick at all. In fact I spent a long time finding a replacement car and dismissed any which didn't have smart key immediately.
Soldato
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Having owned a car with keyless entry and start and now gone back to a car without it, I certainly do miss the convenience of it, however little effort it saved.
The decreased security is a very minor thing too unless you own an exotic car. There’s a lot of hyperbole in this thread. Not having keyless entry isn’t going to stop someone who wants to steal a car, they’ll just find another way like breaking into your house and running you over when you try to stop them.
The decreased security is a very minor thing too unless you own an exotic car. There’s a lot of hyperbole in this thread. Not having keyless entry isn’t going to stop someone who wants to steal a car, they’ll just find another way like breaking into your house and running you over when you try to stop them.
Same old rubbish. You can't actually come up with any tangible benefits other than the two marginal ones I mentioned, so you just keep spouting the "you don't know because you've never had it" rhetoric
I don't think about my key anyway, as I said its use becomes a totally automatic and almost subconscious action, thus rendering the benefits of keyless very marginal.
You contend I don't know different because I've not had it, well I could just as easily claim that you're blinkered because you do have it and are trying to convince yourself it's more of a benefit than it really is whilst conveniently ignoring the security issues it adds.
"Same old rubbish"?
Why are you so angry at something you've never tried and won't ever affect you as you won't use it in future?
But you asked for tangible benefits:
-My 'key' is the size of a credit card and only slightly thicker. I just slip it in my wallet so that means I'm effectively carrying one less thing.
-There's quite a few times that I've walked to the car and it hasn't opened, then I realise i've forgotten my wallet.
-It means I can't ever lock my keys in the car, even if i try, as the system knows where the key is and won't lock the car from outside if the key is inside. It's much easier to get into the car when your hands are full or carrying stuff.
-Car keys can't be stolen from the ignition when you pull up at lights with your window down http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-dorset-35136868
-Carrying a traditional car key is a veritable health hazard, as proven here http://metro.co.uk/2017/09/01/key-pierces-mans-hand-when-he-trips-up-on-a-pavement-6895463/
- It makes you feel awesome
Ok, so that list descended into the ridiculous, but the start of it is all true. Your turn to make a list, then we vote....