car stolen. security recommendations for next car

magyosha

magyosha

magyosha

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Joined
5 Sep 2023
Posts
10
Location
redditch
hi guys.
last week my pride and joy BMW 730LD G12 was stolen from my house drive. Redditch, Worcestershire. no hope IMHO of recovery as I'd suspect its either in a chop shop or on a boat by now :(. and police do not seem interested other than dishing out a crime number for insurance.
so now I want to make sure that my replacement that will likely be the same car/model (as I loved it to bits lol) cannot be stolen. or at least make it damn hard to steal.
my parking is my drive so I've got to rely on making it hard to steal and easier to recover if it is stolen.
looked at Pandora which for there elite 2 system starts at a whopping £1999 and about another £700 on top for extras. also looked at ghost 2.
while the costs seem a lot in hindsight that £2700 outlay would have saved me money I think my insurance on 3 vehicles is now going to skyrocket for 5 years :( which I've worked put is going to cost neatly £10k extra.

I want alarm. tracker(s). immobiliser(s). recovery. bells. whistles. something that works and would make it impossible short of using a towtruck to steal.

what can you guys recommend
 
You're overlooking the obvious, which is security external to the car. Make sure the front of the house and driveway are well lit. Can you put a gate or collapsible bollard in the driveway? CCTV?

You basically just want to make it very unappealing for someone to attempt to steal it.
 
Semple said:
You're overlooking the obvious, which is security external to the car. Make sure the front of the house and driveway are well lit. Can you put a gate or collapsible bollard in the driveway? CCTV?

You basically just want to make it very unappealing for someone to attempt to steal it.
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not overlooked it. but.
house is a rental with a open drive.
already have cctv which did not deter them. masked with coats with hoods.
bollards are possible but not strong deep ones sadly. and would have to surround the drive with about 15 to stop any exit. so not all that viable. if it was my own house could wall the sides and fit a gate. more cctv has trees in the way. I've looked at lots of options. and keep ending up back on making the car harder to steal being only option.
disconnecting the battery every night would be the cheapest option lol, or jacking it up and taking a wheel off . but I don't think that's a viable option for something to do daily.
more lights are possible but neighbours may be on here complaining about light pollution after that.
 
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What about a heavier wheel clamp? Easier than taking a wheel on and off and it's going to impede things. I'm not sure I'd want to be getting my hands mucky every morning though. A steering wheel lock? I guess there is a risk of them attempting entry to your home then.

A hidden kill switch would be preferable to taking the battery in and out.
 
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Wheel clamps & steering wheel lock will make them think twice especially if removing the wheel clamp involves cutting the tyre!
 
magyosha said:
hi guys.
last week my pride and joy BMW 730LD G12 was stolen from my house drive. Redditch, Worcestershire. no hope IMHO of recovery as I'd suspect its either in a chop shop or on a boat by now :(. and police do not seem interested other than dishing out a crime number for insurance.
so now I want to make sure that my replacement that will likely be the same car/model (as I loved it to bits lol) cannot be stolen. or at least make it damn hard to steal.
my parking is my drive so I've got to rely on making it hard to steal and easier to recover if it is stolen.
looked at Pandora which for there elite 2 system starts at a whopping £1999 and about another £700 on top for extras. also looked at ghost 2.
while the costs seem a lot in hindsight that £2700 outlay would have saved me money I think my insurance on 3 vehicles is now going to skyrocket for 5 years :( which I've worked put is going to cost neatly £10k extra.

I want alarm. tracker(s). immobiliser(s). recovery. bells. whistles. something that works and would make it impossible short of using a towtruck to steal.

what can you guys recommend
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I'm surprised a car like that didn't have an alarm and immobiliser as standard. My car is a 72 plate so it's got fairly decent standard security but instead of paying for an expensive tracker system I've got a cheap smart phone stashed in the car linked to my laptop and my everyday phone that will alert me if the vehicle starts moving. I also use a stoplock on the steering wheel and a wheel clamp at night so I'm fairly confident that my car won't get pinched easily and I'd be able to guide the rozzers to it's location quickly if it did start moving. Spending 2 grand on car security seems a bit extreme but do it if you can afford it and it's a high value car. You could also install a decent CCTV cam linked to a mobile app that alerts you when someone goes past a certain point in your driveway but you would have to spend time playing around with camera angles/positions to make sure that worked properly and didn't turn into a hassle every night that kept waking you up. HTH.

BUDFORCE said:
Buy a 20 year old Volkswagen Polo, no one will nick that.
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Yes but you probably won't even be able to drive it yourself as you'll struggle to even get it started...

Semple said:
collapsible bollard in the driveway
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If I was a homeowner worried about my car in a driveway that's probably the 1st thing I would do and I would have more than 1 bollard.
 
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HC1 said:
I'm surprised a car like that didn't have an alarm and immobiliser as standard. My car is a 72 plate so it's got fairly decent standard security but instead of paying for an expensive tracker system I've got a cheap smart phone stashed in the car linked to my laptop and my everyday phone that will alert me if the vehicle starts moving. I also use a stoplock on the steering wheel and a wheel clamp at night so I'm fairly confident that my car won't get pinched easily and I'd be able to guide the rozzers to it's location quickly if it did start moving. Spending 2 grand on car security seems a bit extreme but do it if you can afford it and it's a high value car. You could also install a decent CCTV cam linked to a mobile app that alerts you when someone goes past a certain point in your driveway but you would have to spend time playing around with camera angles/positions to make that worked properly and didn't turn into a hassle every night that kept waking you up. HTH.
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from what I now gather they clone the remote with some sort of relay either in advance or on the night. and it then thinks the key is there bypassing the built in immobiliser and alarm
 
HC1 said:
If I was a homeowner worried about my car in a driveway that's probably the 1st thing I would do and I would have more than 1 bollard.
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yup. if I owned the house I'd put a load of strong in the ground bollards

AWPC said:
Wheel clamps & steering wheel lock will make them think twice especially if removing the wheel clamp involves cutting the tyre!
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looked many times at these however loads if videos showing them being removed in just a few seconds :(

anyway.
back to my main question
Pandora elite 2. and ghost 2.
anyone know if there worth the money.
do they prevent or just delay drive away theft
 
put the key in a farraday box

if it was me and bought a nice car, the first thing i would have done is gone to https://www.clifford.co.uk/ and get the old alarm changed as ones from the factory are useless, break a window, and the alarm does not go off or use the repeater option by scanning the house from the outside etc

id get a tracker fitter too

id also get one of these as a visible deterrent

www.halfords.com

Disklok Steering Lock (Silver) Medium | Halfords UK

Shop the latest The award winninng Disklok Steering Lock Medium helps to prevent your vehicle from being stolen at Halfords UK
www.halfords.com www.halfords.com



one of my neighbours had one of these fitted :

www.halfords.com

Bulldog Auto Clamp | Halfords UK

Shop the latest Make sure no one makes off with your vehicle with the Bulldog High Security Wheel Clamp. at Halfords UK
www.halfords.com www.halfords.com
 
TBH if they want your car, they will find a way. if that means breaking into your house and threatening you with a knife/gun/pouring boiling water from a kettle over your kids, then that's what they will do. The sooner you accept your car is just a thing that can be replaced and your family are not the better you will be. A car like that isn't stolen 'on a whim' by a passing group of thieves, they likely followed you home or scoped the area out for nice cars previously. Stopping them from taking it easily just raises their stakes and what they're willing to do.
 
MissChief said:
TBH if they want your car, they will find a way. if that means breaking into your house and threatening you with a knife/gun/pouring boiling water from a kettle over your kids, then that's what they will do.
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I disagree on these BMW jobs.

They target these cars because of how ridiculously easy it is to hack them and drive away. They don’t want trouble or want to have to do anything physical to steal the car.
 
Philtor said:
You have clearly put some thought into this MissChief!
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It's a story I've heard many times, especially on BMW forums and other more niche sites like Pistonheads. Sadly. People have moved or stopped buying nice cars for fear of a repeat performance. For a good while Golf R's were as good as an invitation to thieves in some areas of the country and there are posts from more than one person who ended up getting rid simply because they couldn't stand the thought of someone holding a knife to his kids screaming for the keys.
 
hurfdurf said:
I disagree on these BMW jobs.

They target these cars because of how ridiculously easy it is to hack them and drive away. They don’t want trouble or want to have to do anything physical to steal the car.
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This is true for some BMW's but AFAIK it was limited to those with Comfort Access which was an option that unlocked the car as soon as you got close to it automatically. That and the positioning of the Ultrasonic alarm sensors basically to the left of your head meaning breaking the window carefully and then being able to reach down to the OBD Port which is to the right of the footwell on what could be called the A Pillar and then using a scan tool of sorts to reprogram the car to accept a new blank key the thieves had with them meaning they could drive off without even needing the keys from the house. BMW eventually fixed that but hundreds of BMW's were stolen this way.


Although that one uses a relay box to pick up the signal from the keys in the house.
 
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This is a great article that go over the technical details on how it's done on Toyota's. Doesn't require them to get into the car, and no relay boxes needed

CAN Injection: keyless car theft

This is a detective story about how a car was stolen - and how it uncovered an epidemic of high-tech car theft. It begins with a tweet. In April 2022, my friend Ian Tabor tweeted that vandals had been at his car, pulling apart the headlight and unplugging the cables.
kentindell.github.io kentindell.github.io
 
hurfdurf said:
I disagree on these BMW jobs.

They target these cars because of how ridiculously easy it is to hack them and drive away. They don’t want trouble or want to have to do anything physical to steal the car.
Click to expand...

Do you know how many seconds it takes to remove steering wheel locks... And noticed I said seconds not minutes
 
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