Walked out front this morning around 7:45 to head to school, opened my passenger side, noticed RCA cables laying in the floor. Sure enough, driver's side window shattered, radio cleanly removed (unplugged and all) dash perfect, seat leaned foward, my flying bag (with all my records of my pilot training) gone.

That's twice since school began this year.

Cop came out and did an incident report, pulled a fingerprint off of the seat lean forward handle thing. Later today we found out the fingerprint matched the one pulled last time my radio was stolen. And it was removed in the same way. Minus the window being broken.

They also broke into the guy across the street's Honda. Took all his college books and stuff (say ~$600), luckily I found them a street away after I left for school in my mom's truck. Later the police found my flying bag down the street.

I drove the Silverado today, mom took the Ranger, got a new window installed. Now I begin the search for a new radio.

Sorry just wanted to vent a little.

RP
Zach

Can't see much in this pic...little broken glass on the ground and the empty spot where my radio was...

 

Man, that sucks! Did they ever figure out who it was the first time?

 

One time I had a Ford Taurus but it didn't look anything like it. I had some ground effects and a custom paint job it was a sweet ride. Anyways, I had just baught two matching watches at a jewlery store one for my wife and one for me, she was my girlfriend then, both of them were worth over $600. Being that I was a college student then, I was working part time at an Olive Garden restaurant 'till closing time. To make a long story short, they busted my window, stole my watch and my radio was half-way-out! Since it wasn't even 2 weeks since I had baught them, I went to talk to the jewlery store with the police report and they said, did you buy insurence for them? and I said "no....how much was the insurance?" It was only $.10 extra!!!!!!! I got insurance for my wifes watch after that.

 

I'm continually reminded as to why I like parking in my garage at night.

BTW, you can plan on the thief comming back again. The reason why is rather simple. So on that note, I would encourage you to take appropriate steps to deter a future break in. Once that is done, then it's time for a little stereo mod, like the one I did for a buddy years ago. Double sided razor blades super glued to the radio . No stolen stereo, just lots of blood to mop up one morning. No chunks of finger, drat.

*If for some odd reason you elect to have a shop install a new stereo, remember to NOT give them your home address when you buy it.

 

Yeah I'm going tommorow to get a radio and an alarm. I'll get them both in tommorow. Being that my birthday is next Thursday, we'll just cram it all in there together. What's four or five days difference? lol.
Anyways, I gotta clean all the print dust out tonight. Great news, they got a full hand print off the broken window I found out, along with countless ones on the wheel, stick, seat-lean-handle, and dash/bezel. Most will undoubtably be mine, but hopefully some wont. I know the one on the window isn't mine.
I guess we'll see how it turns out. Thanks for lettin' me vent again guys.

And no, I'll be doing all the install work myself. Thanks for the razor blade idea!

 

Two things:
1) Try not to leave anything of value or that looks like it might be of value inside your truck. If the POS thief looks in and doesn't see anything to take, maybe he'll move on.

2) If you put a razor blade on the radio, make sure you carefully remove the blade before you report it because in some places you can be held liable for injury caused to the thief. "Gee sir, I don't know what he cut himself on, he must have tried prying it with a pocket knife...."

 

That sucks man. I feel for you. It's probably some meth head or crack head living in your neighborhood. Check your local pawn shops to see if you see your stuff. I don't lock my truck anymore. I figure if they want to take a CD or anything to let them have it so I dont have to replace my window.

 

Yeah I've heard around here to take the blade off before the police get there. Then again, if the radio is there, I'll probably just let it go anyways. Clean it up, fix damage (unless it's pretty bad), and move along with life.
Either way, tommorow I'm going to get a new radio, alarm, and amp. So I guess I'll see how it goes from there.

 

Get an alarm that allows you to turn off the siren and comes with a pager. Make sure the pager works inside the house. You look too young to risk messing up your life, so when the alarm goes off, call the police instead of beating them senseless.

You can buy radios that flash a message on the face that says something along the lines off "enter access code - call 1-800-stupidjerk for assistance" when reinstalled. Something most thiefs will not be doing.

What the radio OEM does is charge $5 for the access code to a credit card number if the person has "lost" it. Many times the person in receipt of the stolen property gives a cc# tied to their home address. The case gets pretty easy to solve after that when Mr. policeman starts charging someone with receiving stolen property.

 

Sorry to hear that. Mine was stolen a few months back. Took out my quarter window to get in.
I decided to make a cover for the radio this time. I went down to the local hobby shop and bought a sheet of styreen. The white plastic stuff they use to make model cars out of. I cut it the same size as the hole where the radio is. Now when I leave it for any length of time, I just pop that in place. Wa-La no radio, visiable to the outside. When I come back, pop it back out, and there it is, in fact, if I'm only going a short distance, I leave it there.

Of course the radio is installed with pieces of metal bracket bolted to the radio and to the firewall. The thief only used a screwdriver to pull mine the first time, I wanted to make sure he'd need more than that the next.

 

Yeah I was also looking at forcibly mounting it to the metal tray thing the stock radio sat in (in case you don't know, in '94 the stock radio was the same size as aftermarket single-DIN radios). I guess I'll just pull the dash to mount the radio, so I can assure it won't come out without a little effort from the theif. Though I'll admit I'd much rather them run off with my radio then screw my entire dash up getting it out. I've been fortunate both times they've done it in my truck they've just pulled the radio out, unplugged everything, and left. The window wasn't broken the first time.

I'm hoping between the razors, bolting it to the mounting bracket, the alarm, and possibly a plastic cover (that was a good idea...just gotta figure out how to do it), any theif will be deterred and if someone is stupid enough to try it, they're in for a few nasty suprises.

I'll keep you guys updated, thanks again. I'm about to go look for a new radio.

RP
Zach

 

Best of luck, RangerPilot.

One time while driving in the ghetto of Toledo, Ohio, on my way back to the ghetto of Detroit, I stopped in a gas station to pick up smokes for my sister(they are much cheaper in Ohio then in Michigan)

I was in line inside and someone ran in and told the clerk and the counter something and the clerk yelled out to everybody in the store "Would the owner of a blue Ford pickup please come up front! Your window has been broken, and your truck broken into...."

Well my heart stopped beating. Here I was in the ghetto of Toledo at 2am and only in the gas station for 5 minutes in line with about 6 other people and now my truck got broke into??

I ran outside and quickly ran around my truck and I didnt see any broken windows, glass or any sign of entry. I was dumbfounded. What I didnt notice was another guy ran out behind me and he too had a blue Ranger, and it was his that got broke into! The window was smashed and he said outloud that they stole his radio, CD's and his cell phone.

The kicker is he was parked two spots over from me, and I dont know if this was random or planned, but we both had blue Rangers and why his was broke into and not mine is beyond me. It must have happened within that 5 minutes because I didnt notice him parked there when i pulled up to the gas station.

 

That's crazy.

Ok install is done other than the amp, but everything is good for it, I just haven't gotten the time to install it as of yet. Just plug and play from here on out.

The not-so-nice part: I glued the razor blade to the radio. Moral of the story: IF YOU GLUE IT ON, DON'T FORGET IT'S THERE!!! I got a beautiful gash from my thumb to my wrist. Radio's in though, works great, just kinda lonely without the front speakers (amp going to just them).

I'll let you guys know when I'm done. Thanks again and again!

RP
Zach

 

And post pics! Your setup before the crooks got to it was cool

 

Well what would you like pics of? I ran outta black electrical tape so I had to use green, makes the colours quite cool! lol.

I'll take a lot of pics and post them asap. Just tell me what you want.

RP
Zach