Primitive questions theft of car parts

[BattleHymn]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1018555197

Tue Jan 14, 2014, 02:29 PM  Brigid (13,194 posts)

A catalytic converter? Really?

Last edited Tue Jan 14, 2014, 02:30 PM - Edit history (1)
The maintenance supervisor in my condo building sometimes puts up signs in the elevators and on the outside doors to warn us if it's going to be necessary to turn off the water for repairs, or that sort of thing. Today there is one saying that someone cut the catalytic converter out of a car in front of the building last night.

Now why would somebody do that? Do cars even have those things anymore?

Tue Jan 14, 2014, 02:38 PM  Star Member Locut0s (5,478 posts)
1. Apparently so...

I'm not going to bother bringing over LocoNut's copy and past job from wikipedia.  Get a job, you parasite, and quit reading wikipedia.

Tue Jan 14, 2014, 02:41 PM  Star Member klook (4,748 posts)
2. I've heard of them being stolen

I had thought it was just to use them on old cars that couldn't pass emissions/smog inspection, but according to this article, it's for the precious metals in them:
a link to some site

Nationwide Insurance even has info about preventing them from being stolen:
another link to some site

I used to think it was nuts when I heard people were stealing copper tubing and wire out of buildings, too.

Tue Jan 14, 2014, 02:42 PM  Chan790 (15,931 posts)
3. They contain platinum. That's why.

Cut it out, melt it down, sell the metal.

Usually when you see this type of crime, they hit 10 or 15 cars, not 1. One car yields enough precious metal to buy a McDonald's meal. 15 yields a couple hundred bucks.

August 17, 2011 was the last day this loser had a job.  Maybe he's the one going around stealing them?  Also, it's not just the platinum you douche.  Even LocoNuts using wikipedia was more on target.  And you are way, way off on your valuation of what a cat brings at the yard.

Tue Jan 14, 2014, 05:25 PM  Brigid (13,194 posts)
5. Wow.

I didn't know that catalytic converters contained precious metals. The internets are so edjumacashunul.

 

Smartest people in the world.â„¢

[RobJohnson]

Catalytic converter theft has been popular for some time. Long term parking in some airports was a popular place for the theft resulting in security improvements. Despite the fact that Obama has fixed the economy people are still looking for any way they can to put food on the table.

[Carl]

Too funny,all of them "green" religious fanatics and none have a clue about what is out there.
To extrapolate farther it also is a good indication that few leftists know or care about the overall impact and consequences of their belief systems.

[diesel driver]

Makes me glad I "replaced" my catalytic converters a long time ago in my older cars.

Doing my part for glowbull warming.   

[BlueStateSaint]

We, at work, had a rash of SUVs getting their catalytic converters stolen in one of the parking lots.  Coincidentally, it was the one that was closest to two different four-lane highways (think 'high-speed avenues of approach/extraction').  Don't know if they ever caught the culprit(s).

[Delmar]

A little part of me is willing to give a slight acknowledgment to a thief that is willing to crawl under a car and get his hands dirty.  That kind of thief is a step up from one that smashes in windows and steals the radio or whatever is laying on the seat.

Years ago I left my VW parked on the side of town where Obama's sons run wild in the streets and when I came back to my car I found that it had been broken into.  The thief had tried and failed to pry the cheap, stock, bare bones metal-front AM radio out of the dash but left two bags of groceries sitting untouched on the back seat.

[I_B_Perky]

Typically around here they hit the car lots that are in rural areas. They usually get caught too. Typically in the rural car lots there is only one road in and out and a bunch of nothing around it. State cops usually just block the road and wait for them to come out of the car lot.

Last one I saw in the paper the guy watching the security monitor called the state cops and they were waiting by the perps truck when they came back carrying their loot. Kinda hard to run where there is no where to run too... and your truck is parked right there.  Well that and the WV state cops are well known to take out their displeasure on your ass when you make them chase you thru the woods. The county deputies usually just ID the perps off the video, most are well known to the deputies, and go arrest them in the wee hours of the morning at the perps abode.

Gotta love living in a rural state.

[diesel driver]

Typically around here they hit the car lots that are in rural areas. They usually get caught too. Typically in the rural car lots there is only one road in and out and a bunch of nothing around it. State cops usually just block the road and wait for them to come out of the car lot.

Last one I saw in the paper the guy watching the security monitor called the state cops and they were waiting by the perps truck when they came back carrying their loot. Kinda hard to run where there is no where to run too... and your truck is parked right there.  Well that and the WV state cops are well known to take out their displeasure on your ass when you make them chase you thru the woods. The county deputies usually just ID the perps off the video, most are well known to the deputies, and go arrest them in the wee hours of the morning at the perps abode.

Gotta love living in a rural state.

Sounds like my little corner of VA, Perky.

Back in the 80's, I drove a 1966 International Metro-Mite stepvan.  It was my daily driver, my main means of transportation, my work truck, and on weekends, my bike hauler and camper when I went to races on the east coast.

EVERYONE knew me in that truck, and I mean EVERYONE.  ALL the cops would wave at me when I passed them, ALL the local and county ones knew it was ME driving it.

I became good friends with one deputy who we let groundhog hunt on our farm.  He's the sheriff now!   

[BattleHymn]

Back in the 80's, I drove a 1966 International Metro-Mite stepvan. 

This:





Makes me think of this:

[Ralph Wiggum]

jmowreader (26,297 posts)
6. A McDonald's meal for thirty or forty people, maybe...

I had to replace the catalytic converter on my car last year. The money I got from selling the old cat was more than enough to buy the new one.

 

[RobJohnson]

Now I know why Ralph asked to borrow my tools. 

[DefiantSix]

jmowreader (26,297 posts)
6. A McDonald's meal for thirty or forty people, maybe...

I had to replace the catalytic converter on my car last year. The money I got from selling the old cat was more than enough to buy the new one.

 

Yeah... They don't even try to make their bullshit believable anymore. And you were expecting, maybe Hollywood acting at it's finest? 

[diesel driver]

This:





Makes me think of this:

Close.  Sure do miss that thing.  Bought it for $100 back in 1985, drove it fo 10 years, put over 100,000 more miles on it (I had no idea what it had on it when I bought it.)

Put twice what I paid for it for tires, twice, and the only repairs I had to do to it the entire time was a water pump, kingpins, and a few leaf springs.

Sold it for scrap 6 years ago for $450.

[I_B_Perky]

Sounds like my little corner of VA, Perky.

Back in the 80's, I drove a 1966 International Metro-Mite stepvan.  It was my daily driver, my main means of transportation, my work truck, and on weekends, my bike hauler and camper when I went to races on the east coast.

EVERYONE knew me in that truck, and I mean EVERYONE.  ALL the cops would wave at me when I passed them, ALL the local and county ones knew it was ME driving it.

I became good friends with one deputy who we let groundhog hunt on our farm.  He's the sheriff now!   

Pretty much the same here DD... all the senior cops around here are the guys I went to grade/jr/high school with. The young ones all had Mom in school. Nothing funnier than seeing the expression on people's face when you standing in line at the drug store and here is this senior cop in uniform talking to Perky about all the crap we did when we was kids and laughing our ass off!!!   

[BlueStateSaint]

Pretty much the same here DD... all the senior cops around here are the guys I went to grade/jr/high school with. The young ones all had Mom in school. Nothing funnier than seeing the expression on people's face when you standing in line at the drug store and here is this senior cop in uniform talking to Perky about all the crap we did when we was kids and laughing our ass off!!!  

One of my classmates from HS is now the #2 man in the PD of the city I grew up in.  We have some stories . . .