Disgusted!! Rant

brian89gp said:

I would pay extra if there was some method to use aluminum for wiring and AC/gas purposes but even then the bastards would still do a lot of damage trying to steal it before realizing its not copper.

Click to expand...

My exterior electrical feeds to house and barn are aluminum. My exterior gas lines are corrugated stainless. I think copper mains and exterior gas lines are probably pretty rare to find in a residential application.

Joful said:

My exterior electrical feeds to house and barn are aluminum. My exterior gas lines are corrugated stainless. I think copper mains and exterior gas lines are probably pretty rare to find in a residential application.

Click to expand...

Aluminum mains yes, but not interior wiring. Copper wiring in walls is standard and thieves will knock drywall off entire walls to get at it. Or cut the water line coming out of the basement wall flooding the entire thing (required to be copper here). AC refrigerant lines I think are always copper and the condenser coils have copper piping in them. I wish all of it could be aluminum or something else aside from copper to reduce the scrap value of it to "not worth it" levels.

Hah... if someone actually gets inside my house, I hope they find something more valuable than water pipe and wiring to steal!

We had several churches robbed of their AC units last summer for the same exact reason, people wanted to make a few bucks at the scrap yard.

Hopefully karma catches up with the dirtbags. Glad you and yours are OK. I would be fightin mad too.

Joful said:

Hah... if someone actually gets inside my house, I hope they find something more valuable than water pipe and wiring to steal!

Click to expand...

Until I because a father I dreamed of being home when someone broke in.

Fsappo said:

Until I because a father I dreamed of being home when someone broke in.

Click to expand...

Ditto, on that. However, the newspaper article following any event at this house will definitely use the word, "arsenal".

Ouch, sorry to hear that. Opinions vary on the alarm warning stickers, tho, begreen. We have a monitored full house security system, but ended up pulling all of the stickers out of the windows, after reading some opinions on their utility.

Joful said:

Ditto, on that. However, the newspaper article following any event at this house will definitely use the word, "arsenal".

Click to expand...

I only own 3 firearms. I would only use one for home defense, the other two put food on the table. I practice drills with my 5 year old. He sleeps in the same room as I do. He knows that if dad wakes him up and points to the closet furthest from the door, he quietly goes there, lays face down and covers his ears. he has heard a 12 ga enough times squirrel hunting where he should be ok. He also knows if I wake him up and point to the window, he is going for a 5' drop and going to throw rocks at the neighbors window. We practice once in a while, although the 5' drop we go thru much slower than in a real life situation where I may just grab him him Peyton Manning style and launch him thru the window.

I really hope it never comes to that. I get caught daydreaming about blasting thru my bedroom door, but taking the life, even the life of a scumbag may unnerve me after the deed is done/

begreen said:

We left Seattle after incidents in our neighborhood increased including daylight robbery. It's much quieter in the country, for now...

Click to expand...

The exact reason I left Long Island. I had this group of kids from some Salvadorian street gang...M13 or something, break into my car behind my job. At lunch time! In a pretty busy parking lot. These guys were all about 5' tall and 100lbs. I figured I would just shout them away. So I gave em the ole "Hey, if you don't want your arse beat, step away from the car!' treatment. Normally works on kids. Not these guys. They stared at me like they would just gut me for my disrespect. No fear at all. I backed away slowly, waved and walked back into work. Didn't even call the cops. So, I knew Patchogue wasn't the place for me. Tried to see where I could afford to live on LI before I started a family. Landed in Central NY.

That sucks!! Someone died here just last week attempting to score some copper. They fell through the roof though = dead.

Hills Hoard said:

That sucks!! Someone died here just last week attempting to score some copper. They fell through the roof though = dead.

Click to expand...

Instant karma?

firefighterjake said:

Instant karma?

Click to expand...

Seems that way. Hopefully the 2 guys he was with (1 being his brother) think twice before they try and take whats not theirs

I hate the feeling of being robbed....or even vandalism. It's not as much the material stuff, but the feeling of being violated and the senselessness of it.

I've been robbed twice that I can think of - both times by people I knew well. Of course, I've been robbed many more times by employees and vendors!


Sadly, it's a part of mankind that's not going to go away. On the positive end, most crime is actually down...

I grew up in Bridgeport, CT. Near the 25 connector there is an orthodox church with "onion domes" that were copper clad. Someone got up there and peeled all of that cladding off. That's a lot of work. If you're willing to work that hard, why not get a job? The church replaced the missing copper with plastic that looks like copper patina. Almost...

As I was leaving there a couple of years ago, someone had yanked all of the brass plaques off the WWII monuments, they were pulling aluminum gutters off houses, they were breaking into OCCUPIED HOMES (when the people were out) and pulling the copper out of the walls, and battery powered sawzalls were being used to cut all of the catalytic converters off vehicles at the train station. Outside AC units were prime targets too.

A firearm might be useful if you happen to be home, but if they know you have them, they'll just watch for when you aren't and scoop them up.

Maine isn't perfect, but it's a far cry from the savagery of B'port.

johnpma said:

Well an update. They got the guy here in town a mile up the road from the shop. He also had my license plates on his unregistered and uninsured vehicle. Had possession of all kinds of drugs, and stolen merchandise. I received a call from the DA's office to appear in court on 11/24.

Let wait and see how this goes down........

Click to expand...

Unregistered and uninsured vehicle? Lots of drugs and other stolen stuff? Shocking! Would never believe that such a guy would have stolen all that stuff . . . probably society's fault, right?

Good luck with court.

That is great news. We will house, feed and insure him for 5-10 years, pay his public defender and shortly after he is out, he will do it again. I like the story of the guy falling thru the roof better. At least you can have a part in getting one scumbag out of circulation for a while.

Fsappo said:

That is great news. We will house, feed and insure him for 5-10 years, pay his public defender and shortly after he is out, he will do it again. I like the story of the guy falling thru the roof better. At least you can have a part in getting one scumbag out of circulation for a while.

Click to expand...

Maybe he can get married to a young woman while he's in the pokey too like Charlie Manson...

johnpma said:

.... He also had my license plates on his unregistered and uninsured vehicle. .......

Click to expand...

Had you realized the plates were gone? Could have been worse ... vehicle involved in a hit and run and they got the plate no. and got lead back to you.

Glad they got the guy and good luck in court.

I think we ought to have a lot stronger laws on the scrapyards. I went to the local yard a couple years ago, helping a neighbor scrap out some old farm equipment, so she could pay the propane bill. We went on the scale, off the scale, a big crane with a claw thingy grabbed all the stuff off, dumped it in a pile, and another claw thingy picked from that pile, feeding a shredder. Anything coming in gets shredded within minutes. Weighed out, gave my neighbor a check, we were out of there in 5 minutes. Scrap metal is almost like getting a atm card. I think they ought to delay payment a week or so, require a mailing address. a couple

We had a couple of idiots here that tried to tear up a rail on a active track. They were doing it in where the track ran thru a cornfield, the engineer saw them, stopped the train, called the police by cell. Idiots didn't seem to notice the train... The police caught them before they could make any headway. The railroad had their own lawyer at the arraignment.

This was about 10 years ago, a coworker of mine, who lives in Detroit, came home from church with his wife and daughter, to find 2 bums taking the aluminum siding off his house, stuffing it into a shopping cart. The cops arrested the vagrants, but he had his house resided in vinyl. Btw, my friend is black, the bums were white, if that matters to anyone.