Home Security - our neighbour was broken into
Discussion
I am a bit security mad after some break ins
Alarm, cctv (run business from home, so this is dual purpose and use it for monitoring the naughty jack Russell)
Lots of led security flood lights
Timed low energy lamps to come on
Ladders rocked up
Nothing in the garden left about that can be used to help a crime
Dusk to dawn exterior lights (led)
Dash cams in my hobby cars pointing at the key areas
Wireless door bells joined to the exterior gates, when they are opened we get the little mermaid theme played up and downstairs, I modisifed the switch to work on a reed switch. If you get on with your neighbours you can then put this in their house when you are out / on hols, so they can take a look if your back gateis opened
Cheap version of the above is a party popper tacked to the gate, makes people jump and druggies don't like that
Stick a pair of eyes on your gate, there is something in a pair of eyes that is proven to freak people,out, Google that
And my favourite favourite thing is a tv simulator I got from lidl, it's a little box of LEDs that twinkles away, at night it looks like a to going in the spare bedroom, for the first couple of weeks I was getting pissed off with the Mrs, I kept thinking she had left the tv on.
When you leave the house turn around and wave at a window. A lot of crims will be sitting and waiting, if they think someone is in, they will go elsewhere
I have a lot of open access, so I leave black metal tins full of stones in the areas where people up to no good will kick em over
My utility outer door is wood, so I made a drop down blocker for that on the inside, metal mesh on the inside and wooden battens painted white so you can see them through the frosted glass if you are thinking of coming in
Cheap dummy safe on the side in the spare bedroom with a brick in, locked. On the front is a sticker "lock when cash or jewellery is inside" idea is they will think all the good stuff is inside and take it, spending less time looking for more / unable to carry more
Things I want to do
Beam alarms, similar idea to my gate alarms, plays a noise when activated
Laminated film for the windows to prevent them being smashed
I'm getting a raspberry pi for Crimbo, there are some excellent security projects with them.
A few people take the piss out of my diy out of the ordinary approach, but the crime prevention bloke thought some of em were simple but effective, he said you just need to spook them and you are onto a winner
Home security is like an onion, lots of small layers make up the solution, not just one layer
Alarm, cctv (run business from home, so this is dual purpose and use it for monitoring the naughty jack Russell)
Lots of led security flood lights
Timed low energy lamps to come on
Ladders rocked up
Nothing in the garden left about that can be used to help a crime
Dusk to dawn exterior lights (led)
Dash cams in my hobby cars pointing at the key areas
Wireless door bells joined to the exterior gates, when they are opened we get the little mermaid theme played up and downstairs, I modisifed the switch to work on a reed switch. If you get on with your neighbours you can then put this in their house when you are out / on hols, so they can take a look if your back gateis opened
Cheap version of the above is a party popper tacked to the gate, makes people jump and druggies don't like that
Stick a pair of eyes on your gate, there is something in a pair of eyes that is proven to freak people,out, Google that
And my favourite favourite thing is a tv simulator I got from lidl, it's a little box of LEDs that twinkles away, at night it looks like a to going in the spare bedroom, for the first couple of weeks I was getting pissed off with the Mrs, I kept thinking she had left the tv on.
When you leave the house turn around and wave at a window. A lot of crims will be sitting and waiting, if they think someone is in, they will go elsewhere
I have a lot of open access, so I leave black metal tins full of stones in the areas where people up to no good will kick em over
My utility outer door is wood, so I made a drop down blocker for that on the inside, metal mesh on the inside and wooden battens painted white so you can see them through the frosted glass if you are thinking of coming in
Cheap dummy safe on the side in the spare bedroom with a brick in, locked. On the front is a sticker "lock when cash or jewellery is inside" idea is they will think all the good stuff is inside and take it, spending less time looking for more / unable to carry more
Things I want to do
Beam alarms, similar idea to my gate alarms, plays a noise when activated
Laminated film for the windows to prevent them being smashed
I'm getting a raspberry pi for Crimbo, there are some excellent security projects with them.
A few people take the piss out of my diy out of the ordinary approach, but the crime prevention bloke thought some of em were simple but effective, he said you just need to spook them and you are onto a winner
Home security is like an onion, lots of small layers make up the solution, not just one layer
Edited by Spare tyre on Sunday 14th December 23:51
Yazar said:
Sheepshanks said:
speedyguy said:
Jeez I'd move, 
Is it not worth it for a better quality of life and "living in fear" ?
I was thinking that as well! Is it not worth it for a better quality of life and "living in fear" ?
EDIT: wrote the above before the op posted the stats. Time to sell
Just checked and there is an average of 3 'burglaries' a month over the last year
and only 26000 residents, not sure of the number of houses, several thousand though. Doubles in December though.
andy43 said:
I just need to persuade the wife that an additional car on the drive will make the place looked inhabited 24-7....
I think that's good idea. Make it look like someone is in. When we go away our neighbours park one of their cars in our drive.We also leave the curtains to the back bedroom closed, so from the back it looks like someone is working nights.
Spare tyre said:
Cheap version of the above is a party popper tacked to the gate, makes people jump and druggies don't like that
I use the big boys version of this:Alarm mines sold by Henry Krank - they set off blank shotgun cartridges and the world seems to stop when you set it off by accident.
CoolHands said:
Yazar said:
Op- out of curiosity, how many burglaries does it show around your area in the last month/last december on http://www.police.uk
114 on our road!!
Edited by CoolHands on Sunday 14th December 23:40
Renovation said:
I use the big boys version of this:
Alarm mines sold by Henry Krank - they set off blank shotgun cartridges and the world seems to stop when you set it off by accident.
I'd like to do that but I get my parents / helpful neighbours retuning bins etcAlarm mines sold by Henry Krank - they set off blank shotgun cartridges and the world seems to stop when you set it off by accident.
Would give some of these a heart attack!
We were burgled a couple of months ago, they got in through french doors just like yours OP. The BiB told us that the burglers can now break the glass in these large panels very easily and almost silently. I wont state how here for obvious reasons. As you know the glass shatters just like old car windscreens used to.
We were also told that in our area, they are only taking things that can easly slip into pockets. So we had jewellry, cash, an ipod and watch taken Interestingly they don't like I pads, tablets, lap top, phones etc anymore because so many have tracker softwear on them.
The ground floor of the house was untouched apart from the broken glass, they went straight up stairs, drew the curtains and searched for what they wanted. They also went through our filing cabinet and our passports had been looked at but left. The BiB said they were almost certainly after credit cards.
The follow up visit we had from the cime prevention BiB was interesting. She said that she does 5 or 6 visits a week to burgalry victims, but rarely, 1 or 2 a year, to people who have alarms fitted. She reckoned this is still the single biggest single deterent.
We have now fitted a hidden safe, alarm, smart watered all our kit, had 2 x LED spots fitted in the back garden with a dusk to dawn sensor so they are on all night, carpet griper and grease on the fence tops and finnally a couple of cheap programable timers that bring light on at random times when we are away.
We were also told that in our area, they are only taking things that can easly slip into pockets. So we had jewellry, cash, an ipod and watch taken Interestingly they don't like I pads, tablets, lap top, phones etc anymore because so many have tracker softwear on them.
The ground floor of the house was untouched apart from the broken glass, they went straight up stairs, drew the curtains and searched for what they wanted. They also went through our filing cabinet and our passports had been looked at but left. The BiB said they were almost certainly after credit cards.
The follow up visit we had from the cime prevention BiB was interesting. She said that she does 5 or 6 visits a week to burgalry victims, but rarely, 1 or 2 a year, to people who have alarms fitted. She reckoned this is still the single biggest single deterent.
We have now fitted a hidden safe, alarm, smart watered all our kit, had 2 x LED spots fitted in the back garden with a dusk to dawn sensor so they are on all night, carpet griper and grease on the fence tops and finnally a couple of cheap programable timers that bring light on at random times when we are away.
oldnbold said:
We were burgled a couple of months ago, they got in through french doors just like yours OP. The BiB told us that the burglers can now break the glass in these large panels very easily and almost silently. I wont state how here for obvious reasons. As you know the glass shatters just like old car windscreens used to.
We were also told that in our area, they are only taking things that can easly slip into pockets. So we had jewellry, cash, an ipod and watch taken Interestingly they don't like I pads, tablets, lap top, phones etc anymore because so many have tracker softwear on them.
The ground floor of the house was untouched apart from the broken glass, they went straight up stairs, drew the curtains and searched for what they wanted. They also went through our filing cabinet and our passports had been looked at but left. The BiB said they were almost certainly after credit cards.
The follow up visit we had from the cime prevention BiB was interesting. She said that she does 5 or 6 visits a week to burgalry victims, but rarely, 1 or 2 a year, to people who have alarms fitted. She reckoned this is still the single biggest single deterent.
We have now fitted a hidden safe, alarm, smart watered all our kit, had 2 x LED spots fitted in the back garden with a dusk to dawn sensor so they are on all night, carpet griper and grease on the fence tops and finnally a couple of cheap programable timers that bring light on at random times when we are away.
I agree about a good alarm. I've lived in my house since it was built 10 years ago, of the 53 houses on my estate only 1 has ever been broken into in ten years. All houses have an alarm, which covers the whole house with either door contacts or PIR's, all the houses were fitted with steel faced front doors fitted with good quality 5 lever locks, most of the garage doors are roller and garage side or back doors are again steel faced. The only weak points are the patio doors, mine is pretty inaccessible, if it was easy to get to I'd have fitted laminated glass by now, however it's still on my to do list.We were also told that in our area, they are only taking things that can easly slip into pockets. So we had jewellry, cash, an ipod and watch taken Interestingly they don't like I pads, tablets, lap top, phones etc anymore because so many have tracker softwear on them.
The ground floor of the house was untouched apart from the broken glass, they went straight up stairs, drew the curtains and searched for what they wanted. They also went through our filing cabinet and our passports had been looked at but left. The BiB said they were almost certainly after credit cards.
The follow up visit we had from the cime prevention BiB was interesting. She said that she does 5 or 6 visits a week to burgalry victims, but rarely, 1 or 2 a year, to people who have alarms fitted. She reckoned this is still the single biggest single deterent.
We have now fitted a hidden safe, alarm, smart watered all our kit, had 2 x LED spots fitted in the back garden with a dusk to dawn sensor so they are on all night, carpet griper and grease on the fence tops and finnally a couple of cheap programable timers that bring light on at random times when we are away.
andy43 said:
Duly noted - will be adding some of that to our house shortly 
CheersA lot of it is daft but I can say to myself / the Mrs in the middle of the night
That there is no one in in the house cus, we would have heard x, y would be on and y would ringing
The other really good temporary thing was those magnetic door alarms you get, I found a pound shop selling them, they took aaa batteries. You can put these on things like gates, garage doors
I'm really looking forward to my raspberry pi arriving for Crimbo, can do some cool stuff with those with little knowledge
Well I decided I didn't want to be someone who wished afterwards I had done something, so after work I went and bought some expanding bamboo trellis, (£32 for two pieces from B&Q, 1.8m x 0.9m each) and fitted it earlier. I wanted something that would put them off climbing over and the general advice seems to be use something that does not support their weight and is at risk of breaking (this puts them off).
It was actually quite difficult to fit and took a while to work out what to do - various bits of metal I had etc were no use. In the end the best solution was to trap it between the original fence panel and a piece of featherboard cut to length. As you do the screws up it tightens the board trapping the bamboo and is actually quite effective. You can loosen the screws off to adjust the bamboo until you get it straight. I will tidy it up and improve it another time, (re the visual look from the garden) but initially I just want to get it up so this will do for now. I wanted it to look ok from the neighbours point of view.
Obviously it will be easy to break (snap) but it does make a difference - it makes the structure very tall when you're stood in the drive now, so it is a bit off-putting if you were a burglar. It is fairly sturdy though, and I can still use the gate. But at the same time doesn't look like the Berlin wall.
pic showing how I trapped it to hold it in place:
It was actually quite difficult to fit and took a while to work out what to do - various bits of metal I had etc were no use. In the end the best solution was to trap it between the original fence panel and a piece of featherboard cut to length. As you do the screws up it tightens the board trapping the bamboo and is actually quite effective. You can loosen the screws off to adjust the bamboo until you get it straight. I will tidy it up and improve it another time, (re the visual look from the garden) but initially I just want to get it up so this will do for now. I wanted it to look ok from the neighbours point of view.
Obviously it will be easy to break (snap) but it does make a difference - it makes the structure very tall when you're stood in the drive now, so it is a bit off-putting if you were a burglar. It is fairly sturdy though, and I can still use the gate. But at the same time doesn't look like the Berlin wall.
pic showing how I trapped it to hold it in place:
Edited by CoolHands on Monday 15th December 20:06
CoolHands said:
But at the same time doesn't look like the Berlin wall.
It kind of does.Half the height would have done - the point is that you'd have to climb over it and it won't support your weight so you only need a few inches to be effective - I might have added 12 to add visual effect but that looks OTT to me.
Adding blinds will help. The thing about those doors is that visibility is clear from outside to inside during night time.
I've also fitted some solar powered LED motion activated lights plus some garden lights I've got on a random timer. CCTV certainly IS a deterrent by the way but otherwise lighting helps too.
I've also fitted some solar powered LED motion activated lights plus some garden lights I've got on a random timer. CCTV certainly IS a deterrent by the way but otherwise lighting helps too.
Pheo said:
So, these patio upvc doors. What can be done to secure them? we have a conservatory so have the same problem. How much is fitting glass that is hard for them to break?
You can get a plastic film - they sell it for car side windows - I presume it's cheaper than replacing the glass.Otherwise take measurements and get an online quote for laminated glass (same as a car windscreen)
Renovation said:
Pheo said:
So, these patio upvc doors. What can be done to secure them? we have a conservatory so have the same problem. How much is fitting glass that is hard for them to break?
You can get a plastic film - they sell it for car side windows - I presume it's cheaper than replacing the glass.Otherwise take measurements and get an online quote for laminated glass (same as a car windscreen)
Loads on there, tinted, clear, bronze, etched, floral effect... and all with ickle bubbles when fitted
But worth doing - I might try a roll of it on one pane of glass to see exactly how optically clear it is.
Gassing Station | Homes, Gardens and DIY | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff