Lawrence Lile <llile@TOASTMASTER.COM> wrote:
> Now I suppose all the usual car power supply caveats apply:  Power supply
> must take a two-battery jump or a reversed battery.  Pretty easy with a
> series diode, small resistor, 12 volt zener and a 7805 chip.  12 Volt
> relays, normally off (meaning the affected system is normally disabled) to
> save power when the car is not running.
>
> So I guess the thieves follow the wires to find the mechanisms.  Hopefully
I
> can hide the brains well enough to make them hard to locate.  Powerline
> communications over car wiring sounds like nothing but trouble to me, so
> I'll have to hide the wires as best I can.  Work them into a wire harness,
> maybe.
Always works a treat - for best effect use wires that are the same colour as
others in the harness - preferably something with a nice high voltage on it
or something that will kill the engine if cut...

> Now the GPS option - I suppose this means a dedicated cell phone buried
into
> the car somewhere, with a little modem .This also means I'll have to pay
$$$
> a month for a cell phone connection or account.  Seeing as I don't even
have
> cell phone for my hip, I don't know how much this would cost.
Hide a prepay Nokia cellphone and Nokia Cellular DataCard Modem in the glove
compartment and rig it up to the battery. Get an old Toshiba Libretto
sub-notebook, remove the hard drive and replace it with a Compactflash or an
M-Systems DiskOnChip. Install DOS and the CDCM drivers and then set it to
make a call with its current telemetry every 30secs. Use some weird wiring
tricks to confuse the thieves.

> :But say I get one of those grandma accounts that is just for emergencies,
> really cheap per month if it is not used more than a few minutes. .  What
> would be a good way to activate this gps/cell phone combo?  Say the
operator
> of the car has to punch in a code, or activate a hidden capacitive sensor
in
> the dash.  If he doesn't, and the car starts moving for any reason, the
cell
> phone dials my personal 800 number ( I have one).  and begins sending GPS
> coordinates.  I suppose I'd also need to keep the capability of using a
> modem on my home computer (all my modems are in a drawer somewhere..)  or
a
> quick way to send a web page........
Cheap palmtop + cheap phone + simcard + Nokia modem + Garmin GPS system =
headache for thief.

> Let's guess how much would all this cost to implement, up front and per
> month charges?  Any way to do it that doesn't interface with a cell phone?
> Radios? Would the antannaes have to be sticking out of the roof?  How to
> disguidse them?
Nothing long-range unless you used microwaves...

Later.
--
Phil.
philpem@bigfoot.com
http://www.philpem.f9.co.uk/

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