Just a thought along the tazer theme. I live out in the country so these all the time. What about those electric fences for cows. Some run on 12v battery. You could put one of the small gel cell 12v batteries in the storage bin, and wire the door handles. Can't accidently kill somebody like a tazer, but garanteed to wake them up if they open the door handle! And no guys, I'm not joking!

Princess Auto carries the control units, and they must have one of those in Vancouver. As I remember they are a bit pricey (around $180 I think), but still less than a good alarm. Won't do a damn thing for people who ding your car, but it WILL keep their hands off it.

Rob

 

this is actually a very do-able idea ^

the only issues i see, are having a battery that will last a decent amount of time, and then figuring out how to recharge it...if you use the car battery there is a chance of it dieing and then can't start car...maybe design a circuit that uses the alternator for charging somehow...

also, you want to make sure you don't screw up the car's electronics.

second, this still doesn't do much for people who break the window, and wear gloves :\


edit: my idea is to take sound deterence to the extreme. it is possible to do an air-horn setup that can rupture the internal parts of the ear if you are within a 10-foot radius. should be enough to incapacitate the person, or scare them off. plus no one will ignore that...
the negatives of this setup though, is accidently setting it off and loosing your earing, and also the air canister may be bulky.

 

Unfortunately for us in Canada all this stuff that you're talking about is like Prodigy said... illegal. I'm not 100% sure if that story he told there is the truth but I have heard similar ones and debated this subject with various people. Basically it is against the law to hurt people and if people get hurt on your property you are liable. In the states, if you catch someone on your property that you don't know, and they don't answer your question fast enough, "Who the hell are you?", you can shoot them dead (various state laws will make this type of thing NOT legal but most states are the same). Unfortunately if you hurt someone trying to break into your car, that is your property and you are liable. Your insurance company would not cover you for these things and their policy would be void for attempting to do these things. Fortunately most cops find joy in someone hurting a known criminal (ie. you just saw this guy breaking into your car and clobbered him a couple times). You could tell the cops you just subdued this person until they got there.

Darren

 

Actually these things cycle about once a second or so. They are high voltage/low amperage. If you hold a damp blade of grass on the wire, you can feel the jolt slightly (yes I've tried it - might explain a lot eh?). Anyway, since they're low amperage, I believe the battery lasts quite a while - they leave them out on fence posts sometimes...must last a while.

I'm just looking at the Princess catalogue. They have one that runs on 4 d cells, 6v or 12 v for $130. They have a solar powered one that last up to 21 days per charge and does up to 25 miles of fence.

Doesn't sound like they take a lot of power....

 

Mount a bunch of fake cameras on the headline visible through the windows.

 

Then people will just steal the cameras instead I think?