rev up your engines, today I'm going to talk about the most stolen car in
America today and how you can prevent your car from becoming stolen, what is
the most commonly stolen car in America today, well it's the Honda Civic and over
45,000 of them stolen, now I've listened to the pundits and a lot of them say, hey
cars are harder to steal now, but people are becoming dumber they're leaving
their keys in the car or if they're really stupid, they leave a spare
immobilizer in the car, then all somebody has to do is get into the car and push
the button it'll start because the car knows that the immobilizer is already inside
the car or under the tire, and it'll start up, but me I don't totally go for
that explanation and here's why, cuz I got out my phone and I googled, what is
the most wrecked car in the United States that gets in the most accidents, and
did it show, it showed the Honda Civic, so the car that's most stolen
is also the car that's involved in the most wrecks, maybe people think there
aren't that many chop shops out there that steal cars and break them into
pieces and then sell them, but their obviously are, because it's got to be
more than a coincidence that the Honda Civics are the most stolen cars and
they're also the one in the most wrecks so somebody
gets in a wreck they need parts, and if you've priced car
parts lately some even headlight assemblies can be
eight or nine hundred dollars, parts are expensive, so if somebody steals their
car then they're making a hundred percent profit other than what they pay
the thief to steal the car and give it to them, hey I got friends in Jersey, they
said there's a ton of chop shops in Jersey where they're getting cars and
taking them apart and selling the pieces the civics of the most stolen cars, the ones
with the most wrecks so people obviously are stealing them to
sell the parts to the people that wrecked them, because it was kind of
contrary to what I originally thought, I thought the most commonly stolen ones
would be ones that were really expensive because they're worth a lot of money, but
no it's the Honda Civic which isn't a particularly expensive car, but they make
a lot of money because a lot of them get wrecked and they can sell the parts to fix
them, now to understand car theft let's talk a
little about the history of how people tried to keep cars and being stolen
starting with a simple key, now when I was a young mechanic, cars just had
simple keys and a lot of them they didn't have the locking steering column
they didn't have a shifter that was interlocked and stuck in park and you
couldn't get out, they just had a simple key, it was really easy to hotwire those
cars, there's just three wires, you splice two of
them together for the power then the third one you just touch to make the
starter engage and you could drive away, but eventually they realize that wasn't
enough, so they had an interlock system where the steering kind of locks itself
so you can't turn it all the way around it just locks in position, and the
automatic shift would be locked too so you couldn't put it into gear, but for any
thief those weren't that hard systems to break, steering column lock assembly
a lot of times guys could just jam a screwdriver and then break it, a screw
machine where you screw it into where the lock is and you could just pop it
out with a slide hammer, they were pretty easy systems to bypass, but then came
kind of a game changer, this is the Toyota key for this 2007 matrix, now it's
called an immobilizer key and here's how it works, it looks the same as that old
94 Celica, it has a lock on a steering column that keeps the steering wheel
from turning all the way around, and it has an interlock so you can't get into
gear, but this immobilizer system has one
critical difference to it, this key has an immobilizer chip in it, if you have a
key that doesn't have that chip, when you turn the key to start the car, the car won't
start the computer system won't let the fuel injection and ignition system run
the engine, so it's not something that somebody can easily bypass, these are
mobilizing keys they pretty much make it impossible for somebody to steal your
car, unless they have stolen your key or if they got a tow truck and they're just
gonna pick your car up and tow it away, now certainly there are chop shops out
there that do that, they want a car to sell the parts off of it, so they just go
around in a tow truck and they steal cars take them back to the junkyard or
wherever they are and then tear the cars apart, but that's about the only way you
can steal an immobilizer car is by towing it away, because not only
the key that's cut for the system to turn, you also need the chip that
interfaces with a computer to allow the engine to run, further down the evolution
line, some of the modern cars now have these keyless remote, so you don't have a
key in the car, it just has this transponder, you just push
the button to unlock the door, you go inside the computer knows you have the
right key and you just push that starter button, but actually these keyless
systems, hey they're not as secure as the keyed system, especially one was an
immobilizer because you no longer need a key for the car, and these remotes are
relatively generic, yeah they have different signals but professional
mechanic or a professional car thief can get one of these fancy computers, one of
these computers granted they're pretty expensive
if a thief wants your car, they say they're looking for a 2005 Lexus they
can buy one of these blanks all over the place
for very little amount of money and they can use one of these machines to program
this key to work on your car and they can drive away with it, I do that all the
time for customers I don't steal them but if they lose their fob we get
another one and we reprogram it, so that they have one that'll work their car, but
a thief can do the same thing if they get into your car if it has a keyless
remote, and I've seen from security cameras of people they leave their car
and they use their remote, while someone's sitting around their car they can get
into your car by beaming that back into the car, then once they're inside the car
and they have a brand new remote, they can program it to drive away with your
car, goodbye car, so you using your remote to open or lock your doors hey if
there's thieves in the area that are pros, they can get that information when
you beep it their machine will record the frequency and they can get into your
car, so here's a tip if you got an automatic door locks in the keyless
system, when you leave the car, don't use your remote, push the automatic locking
button because that doesn't give any signals out, that's a direct electric
current to the motors, then if anybody's around they won't be able to get your
frequency and then come in and steal your car if they want, so in this case
the older immobilizer key is actually better than one of these keyless systems
because they still have to have a key that fits the car which isn't going to
be easy to make, and then they still have to be able to
an immobilizer chip and there's various different immobilizer chips out there, so
odds are they're not gonna have one that's right for your car, because since
these keyless ignition fobs are mass-produced, you can buy these things
anywhere and a real thief if they're looking for a particular model car, they
can just have a few of these or different models and when they find one
steal it, so what can you do to keep your car from being stolen, aside from not
buying a Honda Civic, well as I said before with those keyless remote you want to be
careful when you use them, and you never want to let other people get hands on
your keys, now I can't stand valet parking for many different reasons, I even have a
whole video on that, but you really don't want to give your key to a valet Parker
who knows they might have a machine in there they're making copies of stuff, you
have no idea what's going on in there, I mean if they force you to valet park
somewhere say, okay you're parking the car but when you're done you're bringing
the key to me at my table so I can have it on me because I've had my car stolen
before, I've even had customers that say when they go to valet park they just
say, I don't let people drive my car I'll tip the valet Parker you show me where to
park and I'll park it and I'll give you a tip, but I don't want anybody driving
my car, and don't do something dumb like it one of those magnetic little holders
stick a key in and put it behind the fender, thieves know people do that they'll
walk around feel it and they get the key away goes your car, and if you're really
worried about your car being stolen, hey you can have one of those systems like
LoJack installed, because thieves are always
looking for the easy way, you make it that much harder they're gonna go
somewhere else, yeah it's bad luck for somebody else but it's good luck for you,
so now you know what the most commonly stolen car in America is, and how you can
prevent your old car from being stolen and maybe why you shouldn't buy a car
that has a keyless remote too, so if you never want to miss another one
of my new car repair videos, remember to ring that Bell!