So I had left my car at the dealer for the 105K service. It took longer than expected due to a couple cracked motor mounts. Well as the car was in their lot at about noon, someone went through the lot, looking at all the cars. I guess he saw my radar detector and iPod, so he broke my passenger window and took them. This was all caught on the security camera and the dealer immediately called the cops and filed a report.

I went to the dealer to check the damage and check the security camera footage. He threw something at the window, but the tint held the window together. He then had to punch the window several times to make a hole big enough to reach in and undo the lock. He did cut himself on the window as there was blood on the seat (that made me happy). I was actually very impressed on how well the tint held the window together, I pushed on the window and it still felt pretty solid, even though it was shattered.

Anyways, the dealer is repairing all damages, replacing the tint, detailing the whole car as well as paying for all stolen items. I made a list of what was taken and gave it to them, total was $720. Dealer is giving me $800. So I'm happy. Its not perfect because I'm missing a lot of music from my iPod, but what can you do.

I saw the video and there clearly were other people legitimately looking at cars in the lot, so I have NO idea how no one heard him breaking the glass or the alarm going off.

Oh well. The dealer is doing their best to make everything right. Cant complain too much about that... Sucks tho.

 

sorry about your troubles.....


butt, it could have been avoided by not leaving anything of value in plain sight, especially leaving the vehicle with a dealer.
I've been without my car for 3 months, as its at a shop getting repaired at the moment.
the first thing I did was take everything out of my car

 

Oh I know, usually I lock everything in the glove box, I was in a rush this time and just forgot. Definitely won't happen again...

 

Sounds like you should post the dealership's name on here so we can give them some props.

 

Wow, didn't know tint could be used as an anti-theft device.

Sucks that it was broken into, but it's very good to hear the dealer's working for you without any trouble, and you're getting a pretty good deal.

What dealer is it?

 

That does suck big time but glad to hear they are covering your lost items. And if you have all your music on your computer you can just sync the new iPod to it and it will add all your music back!!

 

It was Mcgrath Acura of Westmont. Cant say enough good things about them!

Unfortunately this iPod was synced with a computer that died, so I never got around to ripping the music from the iPod onto my current computer.. sooo lots of music gone there.

I was surprised with the tint also. Definitely makes a very quick smash and grab impossible. Usually the whole window will fall out, not so with the tint. That means in a crash it won't let much glass into the car.

 

sounds like a crackhead who broke into your car..who steals ipods anymore?

 

lol ya and this one was ollllddddd no way it'll get more than $20, plus the battery life is nonexistent. It had to be plugged in all the time..

The guy actually looked pretty clean cut, obviously not a stand up citizen tho..

 

now go to the dealer rater website and write a review.

 

Sorry to hear, but when I read "lost music from my iPod"...

Your iPod is synced to your library, right?
Just resync everything and you'll have everything back (given you didn't manually manage your music on your iPod).

 

I did manually manage the music.....

 

Man, how I hate it when people steal crap. But glad for you to have your stuffs replaced and fixed. Just the other day, I got a wallet & pistol stolen from my car in the glove box. I suspected that the thief stole them at night because when I woke up in the morning, my driver's door was barely closed. It has just to be that ONE day that I've accidentally left my car unlocked. So guys and gals, keep all of your doors locked.

 

Sucks then =(

Why not auto-sync the library next time?

 

 

Thanks.

I totally misread that section.

Anywho, if you bought the songs off iTunes, just redownload them.
If your songs were from CDs, re-rip them onto iTunes

If you downloaded your songs via P2P (thanks for supporting us musicians)...

Either way, it's a pain in the ass.

The good news is that the dealer is replacing everything.
Losing your songs is NOTHING. You can get them back, not gone forever.
Just a pain in the ass, as I mentioned.

 

How does one steal a detector anyway. Where do you put it lol. What a loser for stealing that. I never leave anything in my cars when I drop them off. No radar no cds no ipod.

Check local CL for your radar. What kind of radar was it?

 

The ONLY things in my car is a pen, maybe $10 sunglasses if I forget them in there and the AUX tape player for my iPod. I can't stand leaving stuff in the car. I can't even stand change, I take it in my house and put it in a jar lol.

 

That sucks! Im glad the dealership is coming through and helping you out with the damages.

 

Sorry to hear that.
I have to agree about the tint, someone tried breaking into my Civic Si, probably a smash and grab. When they hit the window and it didn't fall apart I guess they gave up, nothing was stolen.

 

Sorry you got your stuff stolen but props to the dealer for fixing everything up and paying you back for what was stolen

 

The music is more adding salt the to wounds than anything. I'll get over it tho. Oh well.

I had a passport escort 9500. I think i'm going to get the mirror mount so even if I remover the detector/put it in the glovebox, there isn't the tell tale suction cup or cup mark on the windshield.

One big thing I don't like is that I had pictures of me and my gf on my iPod... nothing bad, but just feels like an invasion of privacy knowing this tool has any picture of me. I'm sure he'll clear the memory but still.. oh well.

I'm usually pretty good about locking up my stuff in the glovebox so its out of sight, or at LEAST putting it under the seat. The one time I forget.. I've been parking my car on the streets of Chicago for two years with no as much as a scratch on the bumper from crappy parkers. Two days in broad daylight, in a busy area, in a nice area...sheesh.

 

i've had two differnt cars broken into in front of my mom's house in the driveway (and it's not remotely a bad neighborhood). this was a long time ago. since then...i dont' leave anything in my car of value. i learned early.

glad everything is getting taken care of by the dealer.

i know the feeling though with losers breaking into your car....you feel violated.

 

Where do you have your radar detector mounted for it to be so easily seen?

I mount mines at the top of the windshield in the middle of the AS1 line on the left side of the rearview mirror.



Contrary to popular belief, MOUNTING IT IN THE AS1 LINE LIKE I HAVE DOES NOT REDUCE LASER / RADAR SIGNAL DETECTION FROM THE FRONT OR REAR...

I've driven with it like this for about 1 year and 1 month now and have had no problems receiving rear detection for radar / laser as well as front detection. I also have enough room to pull down my mirror visor to block the sun if needed. From outside the vehicle you can not see the radar detector, even if you are standing directly infront of the car with your knee touching the front bumper / grill... It's hidden very nicely.

 

Hmm, is that held in place with a suction cup? I was thinking of having it mounted to the rear view mirror. I had mine on the windshield just above the dash..

 

You know ashdec87 I'm actually a computer guy. Just because a computer "dies" doesn't mean you lost all your music. A lot of people make the mistake of thinking that if you can't turn your computer on you lost all of your files which isn't true. If you take the computer to a computer shop they would be able to get the files (music and pictures) off you your old computer and onto a flash drive or something like that. Then you could just copy them onto your new computer and you wouldn't have lost anything!

 

^ That's me as well and I have had this setup for 5 years with no problems with radar detection and I have had lots of opportunities to test laser and radar over the years.
The Sti Driver is an amazing device and works very well mounted high.

I still would remove the detector at the dealership or any other place I would leave my car. Why take the risk as the OP found out? I usually place the detector and my sunglasses in my laptop case if I drop of the car for service.

The console is a poor place to put a detector if they are in your car and a locked glove box begs for destruction but is at least a little deterrent. In airport parking lots or equivalent, I use the passthru for the detector and lock it so it's secure in the trunk.


Also it might make sense to use the passcode feature on the IPOD touch for some form of security.

 

do you connect/disconnect the charger when you get in and out of the car ? i'm curious as to how its set up.. i work at a dealership and i have seen two cars that have it integrated (somewhere) with indicator lights in front of the cluster.. not sure how they managed that but i would love to know lol

 

Incase of car accidents and emergency stuff that's why at back home and some other European countries, tint is illegal..

Sorry about everything but especially the musics... I know how it is.

 

Yeah it's held on by a windshield mount and 2 suction cups. Comes with the valentine 1. I wouldn't do mirror because

1. It's still in plain sight. When you drive at night cars that drive behind and to the side of you will be able to see it if it goes off because it's right under your mirror... What if a cop drives behind you at night and ends up behind you at a red light or stop sign? He'll probably notice it.

2. Install won't be clean because we can not tap into our rear view mirror as a power source. That means you'll have to get a power source from the dome lights and that will have excess wire hanging behind the rear view down to the detector.

IMO where I have it is just perfect... I thought about putting it on the passenger side but when I sat in the passenger seat I couldn't help but to notice that it was kind of in the way and distracting for the passenger.. Plus it's easier to see above me.

There's no point in disconnecting and reconnecting it everytime I get out the car when I go to places because as I mentioned it's not visible... People that see my car don't know I have one until they get inside and hear me turn the car on. My V1 makes a beep so they notice it.

THE ONLY TIME I disconnect it and take it with me is when I drop the car off to get serviced... Anything that requires a stranger to get in my car and drive it I take it out.

You can stand outside my drivers side door and you wouldn't be able to notice it... Even if you stand at the drivers side front fender/wheel. If you look at the AS1 line where I have it mounted it's very hard to notice..

 

Comp- actually it was the hard drive that crashed.

As for the glove box. At least it would be out of sight. That's what my problem was. Left it out in plain sight. That was dumb of me. Won't happen again.

 

Meko- it's still possible to get into the car. As this guy found out. Just takes an extra couple hits. Plus from inside it's easy to break the window because of how the tint hold the window. And I keep knife in the car that can cut a seat belt and easily go
Through the window

I'll make sure I get the window mount and put it up high like you did. Thanks

 

Yeah I know it's possible, but can't explain that to the government
May be because it prevents glass to go down at first second...I don't know

Hope you won't need that knife for that...

They got in to my car like 5 months ago at downtown Boston for radar and yeah now I also put it up there.

One of my friends at NYC knows some people that does these stuff. Son of a... anyways
He is like "we even check the windshield if it has markings or not... thinking its inside the glove box"

I never liked NYC

 

I ditched the suction cups and simply glued a bracket up high and used the Invisicord for power via dimmable mirror. It's a clean setup and I can disconnect and move to my other car with exact setup easily.

The unit is high and near impossible to see from the outside. The other thing I like is since the unit is high it's easy for me to even mute when I need to do. The only problem with the high mount is you don't have 100% usage of the visor but that improves if you unclip it when you need more visor action. I don't use my visor much so it's not a big deal to me.

Here's my setup:


The front-facing buttons (.vs. top on many units) make a big improvement with the high mount. The V1 and Sti are both good units with front buttons- not sure about all the Escorts.

 

Wow, awesome dealer to cover all that for you.

Also on topic of radar detectors. I ended up going with the Escort Qi45 with this car. So much cleaner, but non-portable.

 

Soo I got my car back from the dealer. Oh man they did an amazing job with the repair and the detailing. It looks better than new, def not like a car with 100K miles. I'm happy to say the least.

Gonna order the new stuff now, for the radar detector I'll try the suction cup way up in the blue tint and see how that looks. If not I'll try gluing a bracket just in front of the visor.. only issue with that is the escorts are kinda long.. We'll see the bracket it cheap.

 

How were you able to tap into the rear view mirror to get power?? I been assuming this whole time that that's not possible lol. Most other cars you can simply un clip a connector that plugs into the back of the mirror, however in our TL there is no clip to un plug..

Instead I wired my V1 to my window lock switch so I have the power to turn it off when I'm driving through shopping centers by just pressing the window lock button.

Also I have a separate mute button that I have hidden by my right knee. When I'm driving I just reach over with my right hand and press the mute button without taking my eyes off the road. I'll snap a picture

 

 

^ You tap into the auto-dimming mirror wire connector. You need to take off the maplight cover- sounds harder than it is but it's super clean and easy. Search on Invisicord on this forum and you'll get the information- that's how I did it.

 

Not like you ever really see any money out of it.

Musicians get 1 penny (if not less) per each album bought. :/