Maybe I'm just not thinking of something, but I might have found a way to make it harder for thieves to get into your car, and impossible to steal the seats - and it won't cost you anything.

I had my door panels off for a long time, and during this time, one of my roomates tried to pull the door shut after getting in a dumb way. If you've ever seen the door panels taken off, there are metal lines for the locking mechanism to the door. He literally pulled these fragile metal lines to close the door, and ended up breaking a little piece of plastic that the top metal line (there are 3 total) fits in to. It's this white diamond shaped piece that pivots in the center and rocks back and forth when you lock/unlock the door.

Here's the interesting part - I never got around to fixing the little plastic piece, but I did put my door panel back on. Now, the only way to open the door is with the physical key, or by using the remote. I can lock/unlock with the key or remote, but there is no way to open the door by using the inside lock. If someone were to slash your top, and reach in to unlock the door, the lock would open up but the door will not.

This might be a bit of a pain in the ass since you won't be able to reach over and unlock the passenger door when someone is getting in - you have to take the key out of the ignition and manually hit the unlock button on the remote - but it does prevent someone from reaching in and unlocking the door. It also makes it IMPOSSIBLE to get the seats out of the car since they cannot open the door.

Climbing in through the frame might be near impossible, especially for "big people" so the only other way I can think of would be to break the glass window and climb in. Again though, they cannot make off with your seats as the door is stuck shut and they'll have an extremely hard time unbolting the seats with a shut door. I don't even know if it's possible to do.

This won't prevent someone from slashing your top of course, but once they try to unlock it and open the door, they might just get frustrated and look elsewhere - especially when they figure out that they cannot open your door!

All you'd have to do is unattach that little piece of plastic.

 

Im gonna look into this a bit more, if so....we can make a sticky for it. Nice work.

 

I can take pictures of the piece that was broken tomorrow or Saturday. It would easily be returnable with a little epoxy or gorilla glue. The top line has a 90 degree bend at the end, and that is the piece that fits into this little piece of plastic. That little plastic piece is what broke, and now prevents the inside door lock from working but keeps the outer key hole and remote fully functional!

I think it'd be extremely hard, if not impossible to steal the seats, and would make trying to steal anything else, including the car, very hard to do as they'd have to climb in through the broken window or through the frame of the convertible top!

 

Nice idea.

 

I have also thought of that. Since the car doesnt have a power door lock button I end up just using the remote inside the car to unlock the passenger door since i am too lazy to reach over and unlock it.

But I have to heir to caution. If you crash and somehow the doors are locked> it might be difficult to get YOU out.

 

Do I have this straight...with this modification, if the door is locked, you cannot unlock it with the physical locks on the inside of the door? Even if they hit the lock button, the door will remain locked and will not open with the inside door handle? Essentially you're removing the ability to unlock the doors without the key or fob?

If the door is unlocked (like if I'm driving around), does the inside door handle still work?

 

Yes that is correct. It physically disables the unlock mechanism inside the car.

 

good thinking man, now we just need an impenatrable soft top

 

my top was slashed this year, the battery cable was cut so there was no juice to open the doors , it was parked getting body work done...so the animals unlatched the top and bent the frame to open it...can be done, would rather not have it happen again, new frames are about 1500 plus the top cost, then again seats are 3500 each...

 

i got the dealer to install with shock sensor along with hood and trunk alarm. So if they going to pop the hood they will be deaf for while by the time they cut the power off. lol

I got a pair of Hella Horn and thinking of installing right in the hood where they open and there will be a total 3 horns (pair of hella + factory) to scream their ear to deaf.