Tractor Theft Prevention

[TractorNH]

This is a hot topic but didn't find any specific threads to answer this question:

Since a lot of tractors (at least in the same brand) share the same key, the key is hardly a theft deterrant. Besides storing your tractor in a locked building or under 24 hour watch by armed guards, what have you done to make your tractor more difficult for the slime-balls of the world to steal? Ideas like adding a hidden switch in a safety inerlock, electronic relays that require a fob, steering cylinder locks, lojack, etc. What makes you sleep better at night besides having your tractor insured?

It just amazes me that these tractors are such big and expensive targets for theft but little is done to secure them. More is done to prevent theft on a $20k car than a $40k or $60k tractor. Just baffles the mind...

 

[Lnk]

We just make sure to have tractors that no one else wants. Being rural as we are, it would take someone with big bells to come up the drive and steal a tractor. We all know all the cars that come down our rural little road. Neighbors watch out for neighbors around here. We did have a guy drive up to our house once that seemed sketchy and had a wandering eye. Said he was looking for someone who used to live here. We are the second owners of this house, so he was full of beans. I let him know we were retired and always home and his friend doesn't live around here as we know all the neighbors. Haven't seen him since. I think he was scoping out the neighborhood.

I know this doesn't help you directly, but know your neighbors. Used to live in MA so I understand that is not how it is up there. You could make it that way...

LNK

 

[M5farms]

just carry insurance and know what lives around you. I don't worry about it too much besides unless they are stealing it to resale they don't exactly have a high speed vehicle . I would say most of the thefts here are just teenagers or drunks going for a ride or just pure meanness.

 

[sixdogs]

Way back I just decided to build a cheap machinery barn for storage and I keep it deadbolt locked at night. Plus, I always leave it in gear so that it's hard for a newbie to figure out to start it. There are times when I need to leave it away from home. If close to a house I'm working on I just park it against the house by a window. If further away I either leave it attached to a big implement or if no implement have been known to chain the tractor it to a tree. Works for me.

The way to get something stolen is to leave it in view so someone knows what you have. That makes the task, if someone is so inclined, much easier. If they can't see it either in a barn or around the corner, it's harder for a crime of opportunity to present itself.

I think the day is coming when we will have some sort of hidden stick-on sender with a long life battery in it that will pinpoint it's location.

 

[/pine]

This is a hot topic but didn't find any specific threads to answer this question:

Since a lot of tractors (at least in the same brand) share the same key, the key is hardly a theft deterrant. Besides storing your tractor in a locked building or under 24 hour watch by armed guards, what have you done to make your tractor more difficult for the slime-balls of the world to steal? Ideas like adding a hidden switch in a safety inerlock, electronic relays that require a fob, steering cylinder locks, lojack, etc. What makes you sleep better at night besides having your tractor insured?

It just amazes me that these tractors are such big and expensive targets for theft but little is done to secure them. More is done to prevent theft on a $20k car than a $40k or $60k tractor. Just baffles the mind...

I don't see it as a "hot" topic but it has been discussed at length in several threads on TBN and other forums...just about every conceivable method of anti theft device/remedy has been covered at length...

 

[seasled]

Locks only keep honest people honest, if thieves really want it it is gone!
Sad reality!

 

[iflywhatevr]

If they really really want it they can have it and insurance can buy me a new one or repair that one. I don’t store equipment outside so it’s kind of out of sight out of mind for would be hooligans. I don’t lock the barn or the tractor cabs.

 

[CMV]

Locked shipping container with 2 cut-proof (yeah, right) padlocks. That's more for the compressor, generator, tools, etc in there than the tractor. I would think those would grow legs first. But someone wants it, they're gonna get it. Best I can hope for is the cameras get real good pics of them and their vehicle. I do try very hard to keep stuff out of sight - someone delivering a load of gravel for example - I try not to have anything interesting "on display". I figure locked gate, locked container, that should be good enough to demonstrate to insurance company that "I tried" (if that even matters), but since remote property, no neighbors within half mile, someone intent on getting anything really has all night to fiddle with it - they'll win.

 

[/pine]

...I do try very hard to keep stuff out of sight...

This is why I refrain from selling stuff on CL (casing looters)

 

[Ritothebull]

I don't really bother to lock anything at my place and I leave my keys in most of my equipment. Were not far from town but we live on a dead-end road in a rural area and don't get many visitors coming up our road unless they know someone or have some business back in here. It might have something to do with all the gunfire that goes on around here in the evening and on weekends.

 

[M5farms]

this reminds me i forgot to look this morning and see if the tedder tractor was still sitting in the hayfield just off the main highway. maybe some one wanted a joyride and teddered the hayfield for me again.

Some things in life are more important than material things.

 

[CMV]

I don't really bother to lock anything at my place and I leave my keys in most of my equipment. Were not far from town but we live on a dead-end road in a rural area and don't get many visitors coming up our road unless they know someone or have some business back in here. It might have something to do with all the gunfire that goes on around here in the evening and on weekends.

My property is primarily a live fire range. Surprising, but the gunfire attracts the looky-loos.... even more surprising, it attracts the deer who will hop the fence to get IN while I'm shooting....

But the mentality (of the people - who knows what the deer are thinking...) is "oh, somebody is sure shooting an awful lot. Let me go pester them"

 

[Tractorable]

Conceal a GPS tracker in your tractor. The Spot Trace anti-theft tracking device has a motion detector and sends you a message the moment it detects movement. It leaves a breadcrumb trail and can be monitored from an app on your phone or from a computer.

Make sure when you conceal it that the device has a clear view of the sky and isn’t concealed under anything metallic. For indefinite life span hard wire it to 12V power.

If stolen, call the cops and give them the coordinates of the new location or put the perps at the wrong end of a gun (not that I would condone any kind of violence).

I keep one in my classic car just for this scenario.

SPOT Trace Anti-Theft Tracking Device Black One Size Amazon.com: SPOT Trace Anti-Theft Tracking Device Black One Size: GPS & Navigation

 

[oosik]

I'm very remote. My 80 acres is at the very end of my mile long driveway. I'm the only person using my driveway. Thirty six years here - two times - a pickup with two guys were just "check out the new driveway". Had to come thru two gates - both signed with big No Trespassing signs.

I held them - the County Sheriff took them into custody and figured it out. I don't fool around - you come into my yard - I dam well better know you or know you are coming or you will have an appointment with the County Sheriff.

I'm know far and wide as the 'ol SOB who turns trespassers into the LEO. The two occurrences happened the second year here. Have had no problems since that time.

 

[dnw64]

I held them - the County Sheriff took them into custody and figured it out.

Is that lawful in WA??

I don't doubt the Sheriff "figured it out" but was he able to convict them if unlawfully detained?

 

[oosik]

dnw64 - I'm very sure if I acted incorrectly - I would have found out - one way or the other. As it was - I never found out what the County Sheriff did or didn't do.

And I really don't care - I've never been bothered by trespassers again. That's the whole point.

 

[jmc]

For a year or so, I had to store my tractor in an unattended pole barn 200 miles away. The dealer installed a hidden switch that shut off the electrically controlled fuel supply. No way it would start when I forgot to flip it back on. If the would-be thieves could troubleshoot that within their attention span, they would probably have real jobs.

 

[Navvet]

Is that lawful in WA??

I don't doubt the Sheriff "figured it out" but was he able to convict them if unlawfully detained?

I don't know about where you're at but around here if they are trespassing on posted property it's not considered unlawful detention, it's holding a criminal for the law.

I also had a senior LEO tell my wife and I "You only have to justify the first shot, all the rest are free. Make sure you use enough to get the job done."

 

[oosik]

I had a State Trooper advise the wife and I - - "When they are finally dead - make sure they are inside the threshold of your house - even if you have to drag them there".


dnw64 - for your sake, I sure hope LEO's respond a lot quicker in your area than around here. A criminal could build the Taj Mahal around here before LEO would arrive from a phone call.

 

[1010]

My tractor would be vulnerable mainly in the fall getting things ready for hunting season, I was thinking about a master power switch, they even have them with keys.
If they want it bad enough they will get it. but at least they'd have to work for it, it might not turn out to good for them if I happen to catch them around it.