How to catch a criminal for $299

There’s not very many things I hate. Sure, Brussels sprouts are up there. So are locked gates. Packed campsites. And clowns getting my favourite tracks closed (you’ll always be in my memories Daniel’s Point Road). But without a doubt, car thieving scumbags are at the top of my list. It’s the gall of them that gets me. Your 4X4 going missing in the night can cost you tens of thousands of dollars. Ruin holiday plans you’d been saving up for. Set back home renovations as you try to rebuild. And damn near financially ruin you if you were un or under insured. And the benefit to them? Maybe a couple of K in hocking yours spotties and roof top tent on Marketplace. It ain’t right.

You’re right Dan, I hate them jerks too, but what do we do about it?

While I’d love to envisage myself committing some sort of Chopper Read style justice, I’m just not that kinda guy. But I know my way around a socket set, so the solution seemed simple, a “Stealth” tracker from Ultimate9. They offer a smaller “Mini” which is perfect for anything super portable (think your dog) and runs off a 4 day battery charge. A larger “Nomad” with a two week battery, designed to be tucked in your backpack on hikes, or your centre console for a cheeky camping trip in the back country.

The Stealth seemed to fit the bill for us bang on. Designed to be permanently mounted inside your pride and joy, it’s packed with a whole host of clever features that’ll give you peace of mind. Tap the parking button on the iCAR app and the tracker will immediately notify you if your rig moves at all, a g-sensor will even register a window breaking or someone driving into your rig while parked and let you know.

A geo-fence can be setup to let you know if your rig leaves or enters a specific place, there’s a 150mAh lithium battery backup battery in case the thief tries to out smart you, and stacks of other neat features. Consider us sold.

The Install

Look, we had originally planned on doing this whole yarn as an install, but there just wasn’t enough meat on the bone to get it done. The instructions were dead simple, mount the unit somewhere hidden, with a direct line of sight to the sky for maximum GPS accuracy. We popped out the glovebox, and mounted it up high under the dash. Easy.

We then had to get a constant source of power to the unit. There’s no obvious markings on the wiring that scream “disconnect me” to a thief so we looped the negative terminal to a ground stud on the firewall, and the positive to the back of the fuse panel. If the car can start, the GPS tracker has power. Simple.

The only real muck around was getting a SIM card to work without costing a fortune. A few hours of digging and we came across a plan from Amaysim that should do the trick perfectly. A $10 card and pay-as-you-go plan got us up and running. The tracker uses about $6 worth of data in a year. Beautiful.

Linked to the iCAR app and we were off and running. The app giving us 30 second updates on exactly where the rig is at any point. After a few minutes parked up it’ll go into sleep mode and change it to 2hr pings to save battery and data, then bump back up again when it detects movement.

So will it actually work?

So you’ve bought the tracker, fitted it all up, and some sleaze ball has pinched it anyway, what happens from here? Well we spoke to someone who resembles a police officer, is known to drive vehicles with red and blue lights, and told us he’d put us on a watch list if we quoted his name, but he gave us some handy info regardless. “If someone’s vehicle was stolen, and they knew where it was I’d go get it, seize it for forensic analysis, and try charge someone.” He tells us. If it’s locked up in a shed out of site I’d need to apply for a warrant. Or I could try and bluff my way in.

With the notifications set up you’re up for a story fitting for the next Underbelly series. “GPS trackers come into their own when the car is mobile,” he says. “We can set up a cordon and close in on it. Remote and regional areas they are a godsend due to the large geographical areas we cover.

If you’re keen to keep a watchful eye over your pride and joy the Stealth tracker from Ultimate9 can be picked up for just $299 over on their site. Or to get a read of all the tech specs tap the link below

Dan Everett