Catalytic converter stolen, has it happened to you?

Last night I apparently got my converter jacked. Thanks goodness my insurance covers it, but I still have to pay a $500 deductible for the repair.

Has this happened to any other duders out there? It has gotten pretty bad in my area, and even though I’m having a cage installed around it, I’m now paranoid it’s just gonna happen again, since I don’t have some other place to park like a garage in my area.

Happened to my Dad's handi-bus-turned-work-vehicle just a few weeks ago and he lives in a pretty small town about an hour from the city where I live. It was the first time I had heard of it being a thing people do but apparently it's because the palladium in the converter makes them valuable.

He didn't want to go through the hassle on insurance so his mechanic just put a straight pipe in its place (I'm not a car person I don't know the technical details). So apparently it runs normal but it just makes the vehicle worse for the environment because the converter would make the exhaust "cleaner" or something? He didn't care about the environmental impact so he's content with the fix and that it won't get ripped out again as there's no value there anymore.

@jjbsterling: for me the straight pipe wasn’t an option because it’s a Prius, but if it was some old junker it might have been. You are right, it’s the palladium, which is weirdly worth more than the whole car put together, which is why I stupidly though I wouldn’t get hit.

I've been hearing of this!

The rare earths are valuable, and a hacksaw is cheap.

Better not happen to me :(

No but I am a bit scared of it happening. Would be a good excuse to get a sports cat and full stainless exhaust though. Can't go straight pipe here (legally) as it fails an MOT. You don''t have an equivalent of an MOT in the US do you?

It varies. There are a lot of states or specific cities that have required emissions testing, but there are still plenty of places that have no requirements.

Happened to me. Was rocking a '98 4Runner at the time, and apparently that particular model was a hot customer for catty theft.

Just happened to my parent’s car. Stole it from a busy mall parking lot in broad daylight. The dealership is expecting 70-90 days for their new on to arrive and is installing a steel plate for $300 to prevent theft. The insurance is paying for a rental for 30 days then it’s apparently on them to work out a deal afterwords. It’s a real sh*t thing to have to go through.

The real question is how many Giant Bomb users are out there stealing catalytic converters, especially now that a bunch of forum users have explained how valuable the palladium is and how apparently easy it is to get away with it, even in broad daylight.

I feel like this forum has lost a lot of its dedicated degenerates and hoodlums, but maybe there are some left.

Heard someone using an angle grinder about 4 in the morning, then the police showed up and sat around 15 minutes then left.

Found out in the morning from a neighbour what is was all about.

Copied from google search:

Catalytic Converter Theft Prevention Advice

1. Park your car in a locked garage where possible, but if this isn't an option, then park it in a well-lit and well-populated area.
2. Park close to fences, walls or a kerb with the exhaust being closest to the fence, wall or kerb to make the theft more difficult.

Is this for real? What the hell.

@the_nubster: Oh yeah, definitely. It's a big problem now. Some guy got caught with a bunch of them in a city just to the north of me. There's a muffler shop in my city that offers to weld rebar over them to deter theft.

Some junkies stole all the converters out of every work truck they could get to. It's real annoying but what are you gonna do. Here is I think my favorite local story about this spree

morningcoffee

Town over from my hometown keeping it classy

https://www.nbcrightnow.com/news/stolen-pasco-playground-slide-found-in-a-burbanks-childrens-room/article_65fd3d9c-813b-11eb-9baf-13380193a9fd.html

My friend got his stolen and the weirdest part of it was the cops actually discovered the theft ring and managed to return the catalytic converter to him. I think he had a 2002 Accord when this happened.

@drspacelove: Talk about more room for activities!

Yeah, if you have a Catalytic converter it might be a good idea to invest a few bucks into a lock or latch guard to you car's hood. For many vehicles there is a correctly sized and shaped "Jimmi Jammer Hood Latch Guard". It can't always stop a theif completely, but you can make is harder and more annoying.

So even a few grams is worth a bunch.

Making it harder to open the hood probably won't matter. The cat thieves are crawling under cars.

Here's an install of a theft deterrent device:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fbce8m2KykU

I actually just watched a Verge video about this a couple days ago.

Yeah, apparently catalytic converter theft has spiked hardcore in the last couple of years.

If only I could bring my Palladium stores from Mass Effect 2 into real-life :/

@thelingo56: ironically, just two days before it happened to me, I watched a cnn video about it which was also the moment I learned it was a thing that existed (I’m not a car guy). I recall thinking “Well, thank goodness that hasn’t happened to me!”

Sucks to be a Prius owner. I guess the saving in gas sort of offsets the theft, if you play around it.

@jimmy106: By the way, I just now, 2 weeks later, got a call from my mechanic saying he sourced the replacement part. To that guy whose folks still waiting weeks later, I am so sorry. The insurance companies don’t seem to have the connections specific mechanics do. I dunno their options at this point, but they may want to make some calls if they haven’t already.

Until I finally opened this thread, I assumed this was viral marketing for the new Steven Soderbergh movie, which among other things is weirdly about a widespread industry conspiracy to obscure how much pollution cars pump out and the existence of catalytic converter technology that would significantly suppress the problem.

...So now I'm the problem I thought already existed! Good movie!