Rep Power: 274

Guys:

My roomie recently had his 92 Toyota SR-5 stolen and probably parted out to Tijuana. He's talking about how that will never happen again, and we've been discussing some locations for a hidden kill switch system. Basically, he is a mechanical engy, I know some EE stuff, so we can pretty confidently make it ourselves, and put all the relays in such a PITA location that a theif would have to almost dissasemble the dash or spend so much time looking for it under the hood as to not make it worth his while.

The thing is, we're trying to think up unique places or things you'd have to do to get the car started, without having said things be a PITA to deal with everytime someone starts the car. Any Suggestions? We don't want things that are common knowledge (Switch in plain sight or in ashtray, turn signal trigger, elights, headlights, etc.

So far we've thought of a few:

1: Cigarette Lighter / 12V power plug has to be connected to a cell charger or something closing the circuit. Charger is an innocuous thing in the car that you prob. wouldn't notice while looking for a switch.

2: A/C buttons or ***** have to be set to a certain position (on a civic e.g. both the defrost and the recirculate air buttons have to be activated for the circuit to close) definitely something you wouldn't see everyday, but could be a PITA if its cold or you forget to reset them.

Any Other Ideas?

 
Rep Power: 564

lol....I saw something in a school paper about a kill switch rigged to a radio station. You had to have it tuned to some random channel before the car would start...how the hell do you do that???? lol

 
Rep Power: 310

tell your buddy to think more about an interior siren on a backup battery than a killswitch. Its more foolproof and it will keep thieves out of your car entirely. Lets say you put in a kill switch and it's the hardest thing to figure. Jack comes along and well, decides to Jack your ride. He slims the door and hops in. Can't start the car though. After a while he decides F it, I'm bailing. But . . . he's plenty frustrated so before he jets he slices your seat and smashes your HU display. . . Its best just to keep these dickholes out of your whip in the first place. I knew a guy who tried to break into a car with an interior siren once, he was like, nope- c ya!

 
Rep Power: 564

do what my friend taught me..

put one of these bitches in your car...after the crook blows out his ear drums he probably won't feel much like stealing your ****

PIEZO

 
Rep Power: 332

The cigarette lighter one is freaking old. Everyone knows about it. The install guys from the shop next to my house were suggesting that one to me.

 
Rep Power: 312

^ yep.. one of those siren things.. put the switch is sorta plain site yet still hidden so it looks like a kill switch..

then put the real kill switch in the under the headliner on a rocker switch

 
Rep Power: 0

My question is why even bother with a kill switch? As it has already been shown, once the location is discovered, the car is compromised. There are plenty of inexpensive and highly effective passive immobilizers on the market. Clifford virtual key for example is similar to the device we have in the latest Hondas. They have a coded tag on your keychain which is picked up by an antenna mounted in the steering column. It then closes off multiple relays so the car can start and stay running. All of the relays are housed in the control unit which is hidden away. Since all of the wires are black and the relays are always wired in the normally open state, finding and pulling out the control unit guarantees the car won't be able to be started. The wires have labeled flags on them so the installer knows how to wire it up. After it is installed and tested, the installer pulls off the flags so even he won't be able to steal the car. There are also many variations of the Clifford virtual key. Some have a tiny coded transponder card as well. Similar idea, all as effective.

 
Rep Power: 338

my favorite killswitch location was piggybacked on the left turn signal. We tried for hours to move the guy's truck into the bay, but nothing we did would make the car start. finally had to call him, he had forgotten to tell us the car wouldnt start unless the left turn signal was on.