Good Reason To Lock Your Car

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Bill B
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Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by Bill B »

Criminals are not the only reason to lock your vehicle. In Colorada, a bear opened the door and trashed the interior of a Honda Element when looking for food. The worst part was the the Element that this bear destroyed was one of the few manual transmission Elements. Article and video/photo at link below.

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/web/kmg ... -foothills
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by AHTOXA »

If a bear smells food in the car and wants to get in, a locked door would not stop him. Hell, in Alaska remote cabins have 4" nails sticking out of solid wooden boards covering doors and windows as bear deterrent, but they don't work 100% either.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by ClutchDisc »

I always lock my car, even if I'm only going away for a few minutes.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by AHTOXA »

My old Wrangler was never locked. I never kept anything in it. All other cars are locked but not all the time.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by tankinbeans »

I lock Clifford, but Olie has a weak hinge anyway so he doesn't get locked.

You could almost blow on Olie's door and it would fall off.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by AHTOXA »

Not sure how a weak hinge would affect the locking mechanism?
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by tankinbeans »

AHTOXA wrote:Not sure how a weak hinge would affect the locking mechanism?
The door itself has difficulty latching. Locking a door that doesn't latch properly anyway is kind of pointless.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by potownrob »

my cousins out in CT used to not only leave all their doors unlocked (house, car, etc.), but also left the cars in neutral with the ebrake down (out in their yard) when they had manuals and left keys in the ignition too. it took neighbors welcoming themselves into their house (who had been watching the house another time) to make them realize maybe they should lock things up. it took them a while to find the keys to the house...
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by tankinbeans »

I have a friends who leaves his keys in the ignition all the time. Irks me to no end.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by AHTOXA »

Maybe he wants his car stolen? If he's making payments, maybe he's upside down on the load and wants to take advantage of GAP insurance. :mrgreen:
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by tankinbeans »

AHTOXA wrote:Maybe he wants his car stolen? If he's making payments, maybe he's upside down on the load and wants to take advantage of GAP insurance. :mrgreen:
Currently he's driving his brother's car because his Neon was a hoopty. Does the same thing; wonders why I don't want him using mine (other than that he can't get in without hanging off the door and hurling himself about - 500 lbs and quite rotund).
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by watkins »

I would "steal" his car.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by LHOswald »

potownrob wrote:my cousins out in CT used to not only leave all their doors unlocked (house, car, etc.), but also left the cars in neutral with the ebrake down (out in their yard) when they had manuals and left keys in the ignition too. it took neighbors welcoming themselves into their house (who had been watching the house another time) to make them realize maybe they should lock things up. it took them a while to find the keys to the house...
i live in the suburban area of a city\town (was a town, but population density has risen sharply since the town charter was written) and i had a bad habit of not locking my car, although i always make sure to lock the steering column. and i never keep anything valuable in there anyway, even though hondas aren't exactly the hardest cars to steal. my neighbor works for a security company, and his whole house has security cameras all over it, one specifically, pointing directly to my driveway. always figured "who would be stupid enough to mess with a car that has a security camera pointed right at it?" still haven't had any break-ins or anything of the sort...but...

the other day my friend was coming over to hang out, and when i came outside i noticed my car was moved farther up my driveway than usual (my driveway is pretty short). didn't say anything about it to him until he goes "oh by the way, you should start locking your car. when i pulled in i didn't have enough room to park in the driveway without the trunk sticking into the road, so i got in your car, put it in neutral, dropped the e-brake and pushed it up a bit"

it was at that moment, i realized how easy it would be (especially for a manual transmission vehicle) to pop it in neutral and drop the handbrake and throw it on a trailer, or a dump bed. it had never occurred to me before (don't know why). needless to say, i now lock my car whenever I'm not in it.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by watkins »

At work I never lock my car. All summer the windows are down anyway. Not worth it. I also keep my keys in my toolbox, so if I ever needed something, I would have to dig them out first. Too much work.

At home, My car is nearly always locked. Sometimes I forget, but I live on a quiet one way street, so I dont really worry too much. I ALWAYS locked my car at all of my old apartments over the years.
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Re: Good Reason To Lock Your Car

Post by theholycow »

LHOswald wrote:it was at that moment, i realized how easy it would be (especially for a manual transmission vehicle) to pop it in neutral and drop the handbrake and throw it on a trailer, or a dump bed. it had never occurred to me before (don't know why). needless to say, i now lock my car whenever I'm not in it.
It's easy enough to drag a car onto a flatbed or trailer regardless of parking brake, gear, etc.

Still worth locking it though.
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