I'm more perplexed than mad...
Looked at my car today and noticed someone had nicked one of the plastic hinged covers that go over the wiper arm nut. It was the passenger one as well, so they would have had to leant into the middle of the bonnet to pull it off.
Has anyone else ever had anything similarly useless or unmerchantable taken off their cars?
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Mike Farrow
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Drivers door mirror removed from a Rover 214. Removed very carefully.
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The Mercedes badge off my bonnet.
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The Mercedes badge off my bonnet.
And where, if I might be so bold, did you get a Mercedes badge to put on your Ford bonnet?
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L\'escargot.
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VW badge from the front. At the time of the Beastie Boys.
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Passenger door mirror from my Galant. Again, taken very carefully. Just the glass too. The unit, motor, bracket and everything are still in place. I have a temporary glass from Halfords in there until I can get a new one from Mitsubishi.
I also see lots of fog/driving light units missing from mk3 Golfs. They're presumably easily broken and easy to pinch.
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Life is complex; it has real and imaginary parts.
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The glass cut off the front of, I think it was a Fiesta, headlight.
Also, a bunch of students all piled out of a venue, after a good evening, into their small hatch. A shout to the driver, Put the **** heater on!
They then realised someone had cut out the windscreen.
An old 3 ton truck belonging to the local scouts had the clutch stolen. Yes the clutch.
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Front bumper off a Pug 309 - I drove half a mile down the road and got pulled over by a cop for no number plate.
And on a serious note, once disturbed toerags trying to get alloys off another car and when I drove off the next day found bolts missing from all wheels and the others v loose - watch out!
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The plastic cross hatch grid covers off my spot lights on my old Astra. No good to anyone else unless they had exactly the same spotlights.
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I know someone who's had a petrol tank stolen, and someone else who had the engine stolen from their car when it was parked on their driveqway overnight
--
I read often, only post occasionally
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Numberplate.
This week.
Car parked on road.
I'm grossly irritated.
Just waiting for the car to be towed away, too.
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Well it looks like I've got off lightly!
I'm pretty sure it's been nicked. You definately have to pull it to get it off.
Adam, my condolence's. I had a similar experience with my Sprit of Ecstasy. :)
This thread has actually reminded me of other things gone missing, including my mate's dad's "focus" badge. Also when I used to park my car in the street, I came out to it twice to see the wing mirror glass hanging down off its wires. I always wondered why they didn't nick it, until I tried unhooking the wires myself!
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Mike Farrow
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Wiper arm nut, but from the rear wiper and the little Nissan badge from the boot off the Almera. Wouldn't have a clue why, and haven't replaced them.
My mum lost her repeater indicators from her Metro once. Very strange.
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a colleague had their garage broken into and rear windscreen removed.
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Always amused me when the stupid chavs would steal the S and the R from the rear badges of Escorts, to but on their Nova 1.1.
Her indoors had the Vauxhall badge stolen off the back of her 03 Vectra. It obviosuly came off in bits but they still took it away. Why ??????
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Little rubber cap that goes on the end of the aerial missing last week. I thought it had fallen off or caught on a low hedge, until a few days ago it mysteriously was replaced. A real joker at work.
Many years ago someone regularly stole the old tennis ball I put on the tow ball. After about a week of this game I tried greasing the outside of the ball instead of the inside. That stopped it, but was of course then pointless.
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(Some years back) complete set of alloys from mate's new Jag.
Maybe not strange in itself, but they'd dug up half his new front drive to brick the car up on.
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a colleague had their garage broken into and rear windscreen removed.
I've beem to many customers over the years who have had screens stolen, the main one was Nova's, and then metro's. Now screens are bonded it's a very rare occurance.
(Glass-Tech)
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'My mum lost her repeater indicators from her Metro once. Very strange.'
Probably because they were an optional extra and someone did not have them.All wiring present,but some had reflectors instead.Glovebox was optional as well,unbelievable.
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Glovebox was optional as well,unbelievable.
So was the sun visor on the passenger side of the Metro City, IIRC. On the CityX model you had 2 as standard.
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And at the height of the price war in competition with the Fiesta, Metros came with toughened glass windscreens instead of laminated glass to save a precious few pence per car. What price safety?
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A mate of mine had the bonnet stolen from his Rover P6 3500 when it was left during the day in a multi-storey car park. How do you steal a bonnet?
I had all 4 chrome valve covers taken from the wheels on a C-Class Mercedes I once had. Stupidly, I replaced them with identical ones from the Mercedes Dealer and...
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A mate of mine had the bonnet stolen from his Rover P6 3500 when it was left during the day in a multi-storey car park. How do you steal a bonnet? I had all 4 chrome valve covers taken from the wheels on a C-Class Mercedes I once had. Stupidly, I replaced them with identical ones from the Mercedes Dealer and...
In a similar vein; when a friend heard that I'd had the nice OEM steel valve caps stolen from my Vectra GSi Estate, he gave me a set carrying a discrete Lotus badge. To stop these being nicked, I did them up very tightly and carried a spanner in case I needed it. When I did come to use it I found that the valve caps wouldn't come off and I sheared a valve body (instant puncture!) in the process. I ended up going to a tyre dealer to have the remaining three valve caps removed with heat and all four (plus the sheared metal valve body) replaced with cheapo plastic ones...
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Friend of mine had the front doors of his (first shape) rover 214 stolen.
--
Dr Alex Mears
Seat Leon Cupra
If you are in a hole stop digging...unless
you are a miner.
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My sister had the steering wheel nicked off her 1994 Astra (for the air bag prob). She thought they had nicked the glass from both front doors too, but they had just pushed them all the way down into the door! Nothing else was taken however.
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Some years ago I had the battery nicked from a Vauxhall Viva in a Glasgow car park. Bonnet wasn't lockable & opened using a catch on the outside.
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Queen's coronation day.
Dad's mate's shiny new Triumph driven from Cheltenham and parked in a side street near to Buck House
Going home "Strewth, feels a bit sluggish".
Pulled over and popped the bonnet up.
Engine swapped for a knackered one.
A friend drove his MKII Golf GTi away from a train station one day in the late eighties as he so often did. The next morning, when walking towards the front of the car for the first time since the previous morning he noticed that the headlights, spot lights, grille, and front bumper had been stolen. The indicator bulbs bizzarely were still hanging in their holders, so he hadn't had a faster flash rate as a warning of something amiss.
Another friend had his Ford Capri stolen, so when to my surprise I noticed it a few days later parked in a company car park miles from his home and place of work, I stopped and went in to speak to the receptionist. To my embarrassment I found that it had since been recovered and returned to its owner, who had also changed jobs on the Monday of that week; this was now his place of work!
An ex-colleague once admitted to his circle of friends that he had hired a car as a cheap way of replacing all the broken bits on the identical model that he'd just purchased second hand. Toe rag. I'm sure in the real world there is nothing the least bit "strange" about this behaviour but this doesn't make it right.
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Brand new set of wheel trims off the wifes fiesta, we left it in the car park at red funnel Southampton, £10 a day secure parking, yeah right.
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The metal valve caps off my Mondeo.
I haven't replaced them, only with cheap plastic ones, which nobody takes any notice of.
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I used to have a pair of marigold gloves (yellow washing up type)
in the boot of my Mk1 Escort, dont know where they came from or why, but they were there when I acquired the car.
Once evening I cleaned the car inside and out then put the car outside my front door. Next morning the spare tyre was sitting on the top of the boot lid...I must have not quite shut the boot firmly enough, the local 11pm crowd had investigated the boot, ignored the tools, put the spare wheel on the top of the boot and nicked the marigolds.
StarGazer
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3rd set of stainless steel dust caps went, last wwek, from Mrs V's Mx5.
This time, they did it 2 caps per day - guess they must be avoiding being seen, where it parks sometimes.
Just how much value are these, at the local school playground swopshop?????
Plastic again, for a while!!
VB
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Many years ago I went to the local BiB to report the theft of my spare wheel from within the boot of my Cortina 1600E while it was parked in the company secure staff only car park.
Oh just copy the entry above was the reply, I expect some others will be in soon with their reports.
It appeared that it was a regular event to collect the spare wheels with possibly new tyres on so that a bog standard Cortina could the pose as a 1600E.
All made possible by a poor lock on the boot.
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The metal valve caps off my Mondeo. I haven't replaced them, only with cheap plastic ones, which >> nobody takes any notice of.
I got my 2 of metalic blue ones nicked from the Pug (one side).
Strange thing is a few days later i put two new one's one, went in the house for 5 mins, cam eback out and 1 was gone.
I've tightned them with a monkey wrench and they've not been taken. weird thing is, they didn't knick my £20 aerial - that would have been easier to take.
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I've tightned them with a monkey wrench
See my warning above!
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Had a set of washer jets stolen off my Astravan many years ago, while I was sat in it!
Might not count though, since it was done by a group of monkeys...
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A set of wheel trims from the wife's Mondeo. The only strange thing was that they were Halford's ones and were manky, scratched and with bits broken off.
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I used to work on a farm which was in the middle of three competing tractor dealers, every now and then one of the local farmers would hint that he was thinking of buying a new tractor and suddenly there would be new tractors everywhere, we would keep them for a few days and did most of our ploughing and other field work, and our older tractors would gain new steps ,tool boxes ect.
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>>>A mate of mine had the bonnet stolen from his Rover P6 3500 when it was left during the day in a multi-storey car park. How do you steal a bonnet?<<<
Quite easily on those cars! If that's recent, shame on the person who did that to somebody's classic--- obviously couldn't find the right one in a breakers.
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Brother once had a complete indicator cluster nicked off his Fiat Uno. As he had parked behind another Fiat Uno with a broken indicator cluster, he had noted its reg. no.
Reported to police, they visited the owner of the other car, and he owned up !
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My mates dad had his Jeep broken into in a college car park - the phone and stereo were ignored and the only thing stolen was an opened packet of Extra Strong Mints.
I assume they were disturbed - a broken window for half a packat of mints!
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This reminds me of something that happened to me when a mere green youth. When I left a disco there was a group around a car near mine and one asked if I had a wheel brace as they had a flat. Happy to help and got it out of the locked boot - leaving the boot open (Mistake). While I was with the group one of them had sneaked back to my car and knicked the spare - my car was the same type, an old style mini and common then. Being dark I didn't realise this till next morning when I went to put the brace back properly. I suppose I was lucky that I didn't notice it at the time and challenged them as I most likely would have been beaten up!!
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A friend of a friend had his car* nicked from outside his house.
He got postcards of the car in various european locations, and finally a receipt for its sale posted to him from turkey. We think it was the brother of the Italian girl he jilted.
*Moris marina TC coupe I seem to recall.
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A friend of a friend had his car* nicked from outside his house.
*Moris marina TC coupe I seem to recall.
Obviously did him a favour then!
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Slightly off topic, so apologies.
A mate of mine had his house broken into. The thief cut himself on the broken window on his way in, some change fell out of his pocket and he left, leaving a bit of blood and few quid on the floor.
V
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You lot must park in some theft-prone neighbourhoods. The only thing I've ever had nicked from my car was about 2 gallons of petrol at a stock car meeting in about 1968 ~ before the days of locking petrol caps. I've never experienced any attempted theft or vandal damage either. (Touch wood!)
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L\'escargot.
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I once heard of a gearbox being stolen from a lorry parked on a farm. This heavy component probably needed a few taps with a mallet to free up surfaces etc - not to mention cries from the thieves as they skinned their knucles undoing all the bolts - surely someone heard something!!!!
Cheers, SS
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Had a pair of Cibie Super Oscar Spots stolen off the front of my Ford Capri parked in a nightclub car park. 21st birthday present from my first love. (The lamps not the car).
A week later when I was on nights I saw them on the front of a car being driven. Despite being sprayed bright green I could identify them as mine.
The drivers face was a picture when I explained that they were mine he'd stolen and then he was duly nicked.
Fullchat
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Had a pair of Cibie Super Oscar Spots stolen off the front of my Ford Capri parked in a nightclub car park.
>>I lost my spot lights of my Cortina 1600E while it was parked in the company secure staff carpark.
Any other ugrade to a low rent Cortina.
A downside of owning the 1600E was, wheels, spotlights, badges, grill all likely to get pinched.
>
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I had a my Mk IV Cortina Crusader nicked.
I was invited to view it by BiB just 12 hours later the next morning.
It was in a field by Brighton racecourse.
Not a panel was damaged but it was slightly incomplete.
The WHOLE interior was missing also doors, boot lid and some parts from the engine. But wheels with new tyres still in place.
An unusual write off? BiB said thet knew who was resposible.
Again a Ghia type upgrade to a low rent model.
It was quite odd kneeling in the footwell with a pair of moles clamped on the steering column so I could steer it during its tow across a field to the road by the recovery boys.
Then the joy of finding a one way hire on a bank holiday Monday.
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Came over to UK recently to pick up our latest 'mature' Honda (well that's what the Honda dealer's service sheet calls it) and noticed it had rather nifty little valve dustcaps with coloured pressure indicators. Left it for one hour parked by the roadside in the centre of Weymouth and guess what? Less than 24 hours later it was driven into and left with a lot of ingrained white paint and a creased front wing. I was glad to get it out of the country...
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Friend had his garage broken into, could not see anything amiss immediatly. Next morning in the light found all 4 carbs gone of his Kawasaki.
Bill
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