Lately there’s been some burglaries in my town, some in areas that are near the new house I’m finishing up. All are in unoccupied homes, even if the home is regularly occupied, the burglaries happen during the daytime or while the owners are gone. Nothing’s been solved.
Now, my house is hard to see from the road, and it’s got a locked chain across the driveway and locked doors. But people can break into anything given enough time and incentive, and I have a LOT of tools and supplies in that house that would really get me upset if they were stolen. Not that I don’t have insurance – I do, but the time and energy to replace stuff is not what I need right now. I am looking for ideas on security for the place, at least for the next couple months until we move in. I have electricity there and my outdoor boiler has a single bulb in the front lighting it up, but I don’t have any other lights or locks. Also don’t have phone hooked up so an internet connection with wireless camera is out of the question. I was thinking of setting up a video camera with a motion sensor but I don’t know anything about this stuff. I’m sure that there are some of you out in the boondocks that have to deal with occasional security issues, or those of you who have to lock up your site or everything walks – what do you do? I’m really not up for buying a lockable trailer or something like that, because it would be a major hassle. I thought about possibly securing a second-story room or basement room with a heavy steel door and deadbolt and putting everything in there. I do have a job box which is impossible to move when full.
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Unfortunetly I have been on the losing end of many thefts in a condo project I am working on. We had numerous issues ranging from romex and copper supply lines being ripped out during mechanical stage to appliances being stolen from finished units. What has been the most effective and affordable solution is purchasing cheap motion alarms at entry points. They simply plug into the wall and have battery back-ups. When tripped they sound a very loud alarm. When the theves enter the units and the alarm goes off, they don't touch anything and I'm assuming make a quick exit. If they stayed and found the device...it could be disarmed. But I'm guessing most would not take that chance. Also talking to neighbors and asking them to keep an eye out may help. Remember to keep things secure and as locked up as you can. If they want in...they'll get in. But making them work for it may make them look for an easier target. Law enforcement won't get involved until a crime has taken place. And even if it has, they have bigger fish to fry.
I do all copper work, gutters and roofing. YUP, even in the hinterlands of KY. theft is a concern. I am on a job now that runs into the gazillions ( 16,400 sqft fin, 20 K total). I'd guess we are hanging at least 20K in cu alone.
Storage on site is well covered by the GC, BUT..if some lowlife lifts anything as far as prefabbed drops, inside miters ( or outside for that fact) I am at a flat stall, that stuff must be ordered and shipped, or we site fab it. I prefer the shipped in cuz miters are a PITA to fab, but then again, bythe time the shell reaches our realm, not much is Square, so we still have to fab to it, premade miters are close, but do not meet our needs.
Bottom line is thieves don't know thier craft very well, they steal, what is accessible, not what is of the most value..idiots.
I'd hire a thief with the gumption to take off my work, cus it takes a real effort..but take a drill bit outta my truck, I'd break his hand. I need that, to carry on, he don't.
We do a bit of work following them...job security IMO.
Carry on my wayward sons, I need the work. Just doan lemme catcha in the act, er else I'll make a real worker outta ya, and hire ya for your willingness to work HARD.
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Shooting rubber bands at the Moon
Securing a room isn't a bad idea, but this happened to a friend of mine. Gets a call at work from his alarm company, goes home to see why the alarm went off. Someone broke into the crawl space door. He puts a new plywood door on it with 2 hasps. Next week, he gets home to find the house ransacked. The thieves screwed the same door shut at the alarm contact and cut out the rest with a cordless sawzall, then cut a hole in the floor from underneath. There was a pile of stuff that wouldn't fit through the hole, but they made off with tools, electronics, etc.
You mentioned you didn't want to buy a trailer. Would you rent (and is there space for) a sea container? They're not Fort Knox, but enough of a PITA to get into that the thieves might go elsewhere for their discount.
You can buy some pretty realistic looking dummy video cameras inexpensively.
I rented a trailer like thing from MiniMobil. About $70 a month for the 8X8X10 or thereabouts. Nice strong lock on it, which you get to keep at the end.
How about a couple of big, mean junkyard dogs?
Seriously, your best bet would be to rent a 20' container and store everything in that. That is what all the commercial GC's use on the big sites here. If you put on a good, armoured, high-security padlock, it takes a cutting torch to get into one of those without the key. And you can't just back up to it and drive away like you can with a trailer: no wheels.
Dinosaur
How now, Mighty Sauron, that thou art not brought
low by this? For thine evil pales before that which
foolish men call Justice....
you get cell service??
http://oxblue.com/product/?c=overview
or local WIFI?
http://www.wifieyeinc.com/
probably not the cheapest option in either case. Go with a shipping container. My friend had one out at his site, he lost a little bit of lumber, but they never touched that container. Too much trouble.
Good Luck on your house
D.
Joe.....
Years ago we had a breakin at our home, and when the cops came investigate, they said, ' do something that says you guys got an alarm"
This was based on the premise that "b*llsh*t baffles brains"
Ergo, here's my suggestion to give that impression that may make the bad guys go lookin fer easier pickings
You go to "the source" and purchase, for 5 bucks a pop, flashing red bicycle led flashers. Put batteries in em, turn em on and pop em into some 3" abs pipe with holes drilled into the sides and caps top and bottom .......
I't's late a nite and the burgulators peek into the windows and see sundry flashing red lights seemingly at random (Guaranteed they ain't seen anything like it before....) They gonna have to be real dumb to proceed any further (course they is dumb to start with, the question is just how dumb...)
Course, you could always ramp it up a notch and go to the dollar store and purchase a "personal alarm" or two and pop em into stuff that you imagine might be fodder for the fiends, Heck, if yer at the closed in stage, you could even purchase a "magnetic sensor" from radio shack and tape it on the front door so that any idiot could see that there was some kinda security possibly hooked up.
Bottom line is 25 bucks and you could scare significant bejessus out of any would-be thief, at least enuf to make them think they should go elsewhere.
Most of the folks in this world is honest, and the others ain't real smart.
25 buck is Cheap insurance when there ain't other options.
Eric