Gone In A Lot Less Than 60 Seconds 

I had a shut off valve in the fuel line. It would start and run for a minute. Got arrested one night ironically. I came out of the club popped my hood and turned the valve on. Then a zillion cops descended on me and arrested me for stealing my own car.

Whenever I go to the movies I take the battery with me and deflate all the tires just to be safe.

Thank you Tony...... I now can afford my next muscle car.

Thank you Ultra Kathy for filming as always and being left in a parking lot with a crazy man showing us how to steal... your AWESOME

I can forgive a lot of shit. But in this day and age, stealing another mans old car should be a capital offence.

I love the way he kept looking towards the entrance. Had to make sure the owner wasn't coming out. 😁

my friend jon had a 440 6pk cuda in the mid 70's . one night he see's the door open and a pair of legs hanging out. he walks up to the guy and asked if there was a problem? the guy replied "just a minute im almost done" Jon garbed the door of his purple cuda and slammed it on the guys legs. Jon is a very large guy and if you own an e-body you know what the doors weigh.

I have an old step van I use in my work. I had to rewire it. I didn't even bother to put a key switch in it. I did put a kill switch in the narrow space between the dash and the side panel. Then I labeled the start button "Siren" and the horn button "Start" . We do what we can.

Dang it.. uncle Tony, you're teaching those Tennessee tweekers how to steal your own car.

A double pole double throw relay wired to the negative and a horn. So when you start your vehicle normally, (connect relay power to ignition on) the relay kicks on and continues the normal circuit. But when they key isn't on and the relay in the normally closed position,the horn circuit is active when the (hot wire) is applied.

We had 3 cars stolen growing up in the 70s in the Bronx. 4th time my dad and the other men in the neighborhood caught the guys in the act they didn’t steal nothing after that.

Used the cigarette lighter. Push it in car runs pull it out doesn’t. There’s a push button switch in back. The best hiding place is in plane site

A close friend of mine told me a story about his father on the flight line in WWII. He had a scooter to save some walking as he checked planes. He had it stolen so many times he ran a hot wire from the coil to the seat. The first victim jumped on it, fired it up and once his junk was hit with the 1.21 gigawatts he ghosted the scooter and cried his eyes out. Perhaps a switch that energizes a circuit to the seat....if nothin else it would be funny to watch! Keep up the good work man!

Now all you need to keep it from being stolen 99% of the time is a manual transmission and choke

My old trade school teacher had a loud speaker mounted inside the car that was a 145db siren it went off in 5 seconds if you didn't flick the switch off. You might pinch the car but you will be permanently deaf as a result. We had ear protection on and it still have us a ringing in our ears for that whole day

I remember as kid we went to visit my great grandfather at the nursing home and my brother flushed the car keys. my dad used a paper clip to pop out the ignition on a 66 impala and we drove home with a screw driver to start it .

I got a good chuckle out of this one. It reminded me of the time my Aircraft Maintenance Officer's 1984 Corvette was stolen one night while he was at the movies in Irvine, CA. The thieves figured out the only part of the car not protected by the factory security system was the windshield, so they took it out and left it laying in the parking lot where the car had been.

My dad told me about taking a joyride in the high school football coach's new 1956 Chevrolet Bel Air. It was even easier than hotwiring, it was a small town and everyone left their keys in the ignition. He had a great time until he brought the car back to re-park it and the coach was there waiting for him.

I love your guys videos that are shot outside at night. It just seems like your natural environment.

I used to work as a Helicopter Field mechanic. When we moved from job to job, we had to drive all of our equipment to the new site. (3 pickups and 3 semi's.) One particular time, we moved, and the guy driving our boom truck parked it under the rotors of the helicopter that evening...probably planned on moving it before going home, but they got busy and forgot. I came in with the boss in the morning. Boss sends another guy out to move the truck. he comes back in and says he can't, the keys are missing. Bossman is pissed, calls the guy...no answer. So he calls the hotel, and tells them to ring his room and keep it ringing until he answers, then tells him to get his butt in a pickup and bring the keys out, he is holding up flight operations. I told the boss I could move the truck, he said go for it. walked out with a piece of stainless steel safety wire, jumped the ignition switch and fired it up. Asked the boss if he was going to call the other guy and tell him to go back to bed. He said, no, this is his punishment for screwing up! lol

The point of the club wasn't to make it impossible to steal your car. If someone wants your car bad enough then they will steal it. Even today. The point was to make it slightly more difficult to steal, and therefore less attractive, than the car parked next to it. It's like that old joke where two guys are getting chased by a bear. The one guy says that they are doomed because they will never outrun the bear. The other guy says that he isn't trying to outrun the bear. He informs the other guy that, "i'm just trying to outrun you!"

The dip stick works pretty well for jumping the starter solenoid to, I used to steal my falcon all the time when I misplaced my keys.

I wish this video was longer, defiantly needs a part 2 with more stories

I replace my coil wire with another that is grounded out! There's also a kill switch labeled fuel on the dash that actually turns the fuel pump on so you can hear it, but it kills spark to the ignition! The real fuel pump switch is under the dash like a kill switch but it will only turn the pump on if the decoy switch is in 1 of 4 positions!

Yeah, I can remember with my 1st 57 Chevy, if I were to take it to the mall or movies etc.. I would pull the coil wire. But it also had an electric fuel pump that had a hidden toggle switch, under the dash. And that was 1981. Sold it in 89. Never had it stolen. Thanks for the video

My dad said in the mid 70s he was at the mall in the Davenport iowa and someone got into his 67 camaro convertible, tried to hot wire it and take the aftermarket radio. They failed. My dad somehow theft proofed it. He designed weapons for the military, he always thought a step ahead.

I used to 'borrow' cars back in the 70's. I always put them back in the morning. Sometimes with a full tank.

my kill switch was always a few issues of latest Guns & Ammo magazines on the passenger seat. It was hilarious seeing people peer in the window and jump back when they say the magazines. Made them think.

heard about a fella making a guitar amp jack so you needed a particular jack inserted to complete the circuit

When I was in high school in the late 1960s, a schoolmate had an early 1950s Chevy he discovered could be started with his school locker key. No difference in operation, same functionality as the original key. And when he said that, several friends were like, "Oh yeah, you can use a narrow blade screwdriver, anything with those old Chevys..."

Theres those later 80s GMs that you break the steering column liner away and pull on the rod with a set of vice grips to start it

On a vw bug you disconnect the tag light and plug it on the coil, turn on the park lights a roll start it.

100% effective, melt a chocolate bar into a diaper and leave on front seat

A worn out carb did the trick for me, I could barely start the car. One extra pedal pump and you were screwed.

The best theft deterrent is to have a car not worth stealing

I had a rather exhaustive method I wanted to do, which is to build a dynamic kill-to-ground circuit - since I love to leave stuff running. So I wanted a parallel circuit to loop through an industrial limiter switch mounted to the transmission housing. The purpose would be that when the main line (kill switch) is set, the limiter would allow current until the shifter passed into neutral. This would allow you to conveniently flip your switch (leave the doors unlocked) with the car running but as soon as the limiter passes neutral to drive, the limiter cuts power. I always loved how cop cars had this feature and thought this would be a neat way to make it for an analog system.

I'll never forget discovering and watching the original Gone in 60 Seconds as a teen in the late 90s/early 2000s. Love that movie. A few cool tricks shown off early in the movie.

In this episode Uncle Tony teaches yall how to ruin my life .. with ease 😳😳

I had a '72 Valiant and I soon discovered it was just as quick to slide the key along the vent window seal to pop open the locking lever, reach in and pull up the lock knob as it was to get the key to work in the door lock mechanism. Pre-Nissan 720 Datsun pickup trucks had a non-locking steering column, and a simple multi-contact connector plugged into the ignition switch. Pull out the connector, plug in your "octopus" of various gauge wires fitted with spade lug terminals, and connect main power, ground, accessory and then just tap the starter lug to get it to turn over. I would occasionally create quite a stir on cruise nights when I'd borrow a friend's truck to run an errand and he'd realize later he hadn't handed me his keys. Having obtained a Datsun 510 parts car to aid in replacing several items on my beloved 510 hot rod - including the full wiring harness - I finished the rite of passage of a total automobile rewire in a mere 2 days, only to have the car greet me with silence when I turned the key. Silly me, I had swapped wires from a rare automatic equipped Datsun into a manually shifted one. Once I figured out which park and neutral switch wires were dangling free, they became the centerpiece of a spiffy low-buck antitheft system.

I grew up in NY in the same time as Tony. I had the hood chain to keep the battery from getting stolen. They would steal your battery and knew you had to replace it and then come back and steal the new one. I put a kill switch in series with the neutral safety switch.

When I was about 6 years old in the 1970's in the UK, I was with my family in a car park. My father had a Ford Granada and a stranger had locked himself out of his Ford Cortina. My father jokingly said to try his keys and they opened his Cortina perfectly. I think back then Ford and other car manufacturers did not have a wide range of key combinations.

A remote battery disconnect switch (always on neg side) is usually enough of a deterent around here . All our junk has them , more for keeping the barn from burning down than anything else though.

Best kill switch ive seen to date was on a Early 2000’s tacoma. You had to pull the high beam lever towards you. Then when it starts, let it go. No one would think of that!

Seen a ground killswitch controlled by a headlight push once... On a 40s coupe I was in the repo business... A lot of cars that era had regular pin tumbler locks. Double wafers and slim Jim shielding came first, then anti hotwire circuits, then resistor and transponder keys backed by ECM or BCM or SKIM. Slidehammer or under dash hotwire were the best ways before the late 80s. Still were for cheap cars till about 2001. Blank key ECM and unscrewing ignition cylinder will start anything newer; any new car can have transponder "seed" override with a quality flash setup; transponder and lock cylinder are 100% of the security on any 2021 car including a 200k Porsche

I used to remove the rotor and put in in my pocket when i left the car for any length of time. One method that i never tried, i think i read it in a 1960;s Mechanics Illustrated, was to install a 1" hose to the manifold that would go into the cab, then set up a ball valve beneath the dash then send the open end back under the hood so that the sucking sound couldn't be heard in the cab .When the valve was open, the massive vacuum leak would keep the car from running properly.

The old VW's were notoriously easy to hotwire because you didn't even need to bring a wire. The license plate light wire worked for that. When I had mine, I pulled that wire into the bodywork and put an electric fuel pump in it, underneath the car, with a cutoff switch inside of the shift boot. Granted I lived in a pretty good area and remember a few times I'd come out to my Jeep that lived with the doors and top off of it to find that I had forgotten the keys in the ignition overnight lol.

I had a 68 galaxie and lost my keys at school and got wire out of the auto shop and did exactly what you did in 10th grade. Drove it for a week like that till I got a new cylinder installed. Love this channell

After 2 thefts in 2 weeks, my brother installed a kill switch routed to the coil of my '71 wagon. It prevented me driving my car while drunk on a couple of occasions. I forgot it was there.

The original movie Gone In 60 Seconds actually showed folks how to steal some cars. Early 70's. It also sent a message to the automotive industry to make their cars more secure. Good video Uncle Tony!

This video just made me wanna watch the original, “Gone in sixty seconds “ lol!

LOL. Worked at a busy restaurant in Tampa in the seventy's. People were always locking their key in their cars and I got really good at opening locked cars with a coat hanger. Love opening all types of locks to this day as a hobby. Glad it never lead to a life of crime!

Gee Uncle Tony....you sure hot wired that car like a PRO...... 🤔😯🤣

Uncle Tony is pulling a H.B. HALICKI on us.😂

My 68 Coronet R/T got boosted from the movie theater parking lot back in 1985. But the thieves brought it back because it wouldn't shift out of low gear. It had a reverse-manual valve body and they couldn't figure it out so they brought the car back to the lot and stole something else. And this was after breaking the driver window and prying apart the ignition latch. The cops got some good prints and the thieves got busted 3 months later. They were 3 16=year olds from very wealthy families.

What an awesome video, Tony- a mix of history, technical, and practical experience here on display. As others have pointed out, you really do seem in your natural environment outside at night.

Reminded me of a time I forgot my keys inside my Capella. Parked in the morning, went into the office, came back at 5pm to go home and didn't have my keys in my pocket. Couldn't open it with anything I tried so I had to go home to get the spare. Months after someone opened it and stole my radio, speakers, tools from the trunk and left me with the power wire from the battery chopped and one tire slashed. Memories... Now the craziest setup I've seen was done by an old man, customer of ours, on an old '69 Toyota Mark II pickup he had since the late 70s. Had a later model seatbelt set installed, the kind that sends a signal to a buzzer and an idiot light on the dash. It was connected to a hidden relay that grounded the signal wire to a tachometer he installed on the steering column. When he told me about it he said: "There's no way in hell a thief is going to put his seatbelt on before starting the engine" And he was right.

My uncle was a Navy CB mechanic and his trick was to disconnect the hot to the cigarette lighter and run the ground wire from the coil to the lighter. Push the lighter in and you had a running car. Take the lighter out and put it in your pocket and car no go. :)

I get the feeling uncle Tony went on a few joy rides back in his day lol

Don't forget using a vaguely similar key and just jiggling it around in the ignition until it turned.

"You can lock your car, but if Uncle Tony wants it... it's gone in sixty seconds."

A lot of the early to mid 60's GM products (such as 63 to 65 Buick Rivieras) were actually sickeningly easy to steal. Unless the owner LOCKED the ignition when they got out instead of just turning the car off, the ignition switch could be turned to start the car with or without the key being in the ignition. Actually during that time MOST if not all GM cars had that same ignition switch setup

Tony your idea of opening the ground to the coil with a switch is clever as heck

Great timing. The ignition on my 65 Vette just went up and i have been talking all week how easy it was too hot wire it. Very scary! Great video as always! Love the passion!

Ive put the same match book in a set of points for years. My kids cant thrash my cars when Im at work.

I had a 1970 Mercury montego (429) I knew the firing order and rotation so well, I took the cap and rotor with me all the time.

In the early 90's I chained and locked the hood on my $600 1974 Dart after someone stole my battery. to add insult when I called the cops they told me to just report it to my insurance. I yelled back and said "what the hell kind of insurance do you think I have on a 1974 Dodge Dart?"

Tony, I've Been reading your magazine articles for years. Never saw this one. You're a beauty my friend lol.

So educational! Dude you're gonna save people so much heartache! Much love uncle tony!

I live in the eastern Tennessee Smoky Mountains. They have the spring rod run going on now. They’ve already had one classic car stolen last night.

Hi Uncle T ! I used to remove the rotor in the distributor. Easy on a big block 70 Challenger SE 4 speed. I STILL have the car ! Love your show. Take care!

I used the the old highbeam switch for the kill switch.

I knew an older guy who had a padlock system connected to his clutch pedal. He would use one of those hard to cut padlocks and lock the clutch pedal to the floor.

Thanks for the lesson Tony😉. Another down side of older cars is the power to engine weight ratios. Sure you had cars making 400+hp all over the place back then but that came from a heavy big block. Nowadays you got small blocks capable of making the same numbers at much less weight. Throw in modern tech and you got little bitty 4 cylinders making double if not more than what that old big block made.

Dad and me used on our classics electric fuel pumps so they where wired into the running light system. And we still have our mid 90s pickup truck setup the same way.

Me and three of my high school buddy's used to go overnight canoeing. You had to leave one of your cars down river . I had a Chevelle at the time , did 3 things crawled under the car with a very small c clamp and pinched the fuel line at the tank , removed the rotor and shuffled the wires around at the cap.

Tony, if someone steals my dart after this video...I'm gonna have to send you a nasty email😂

I had my 1969 Charger stolen in 1980, they pushed it away from the house. I had a kill switch in it, and found it a few blocks away. The Nassau County Police Dept. basically couldn't be bothered after I called them, that's why I went looking for it. I called them back after I found it and they laughed about it..."Lucky You Kid" they said.

When we were teens we would test how fast we could steal our own cars. With a little practice 3 of us could have one of our locked 68-69 darts unlocked and running in 11 seconds. One guy unlocking the breather window with a butter knife, one guy hot wiring the coil and the other using a screwdriver to start it. Good thing we lived in a small town where cars didn't get stolen, because the old cars had zero security.

Fuel shut off valves work great! Buddy of mine had a 70's Chevy C20 with a Cad 472 and an electric fuel pump with a plug under the hood. He'd just unplug the pump and leave the key in it with the doors unlocked. It'd move about 15 feet before the carb ran dry. Nobody ever smashed a window or vandalized it. Had the Coupe De Ville badge on the C pillar right behind the door. It was rarely in the same spot, but it never left the parking lot.

I ground the coil through the cigarette lighter, to start car, pop lighter out. Body of the socket already runs to ground, connect wire from back of lighter socket to negative of coil. Prevents hotwire bypass because it grounds coil.

On my 65 GTO I installed a push button switch in this cigarette lighter receptacle hidden by the lighter. Switch shorted the points to ground.

I knew a guy back in the late'70s, early '80s, friend of a friend of a friend type deal, that used to hang out near new car dealers at night and wait for the car hauler to roll in and unload brand new vehicles. He specialized in Chevy and GMC pickups but got many other vehicles too. When the car hauler left, he would go to the office door, they usually had a mail slot in the door that the driver slipped the keys and paperwork into and take his coat hanger with a hook on the end and fish out the paper work with the keys. He would grab the keys and paperwork to the vehicle he was after, put the rest of the keys and paperwork back. Then drive off with the vehicle of his choice, go straight to his shop with it that was a transmission shop, that never fixed transmissions, just always had a closed sign on the office door and the gate to the lot always shut as his crew totally disassembled the vehicles the same night he stole the vehicles. They were disassembled and the parts put in inventory long before the dealer figured out the vehicle was missing. He got away with it for years, since he would do it randomly, until one day his girlfriend caught him screwing around on her and dropped a dime on his ass! The transmission shop got raided and the whole bunch of them ended up in prison.

I was about to comment on my kill switch being on the points side of the coil, but you had that covered. Also I have those 70s tapered door lock buttons, that you have to grip between fingers, can't be hooked. Nothing will 100% stop them if they really want it, but you still gotta try to make it harder for them.

In my old Monte Carlo I had a switch connected to the door handle. You had to pull the handle just enough before the door would open to enable the starter to work when you turned the key. So there was no visible switch that you could find.

LOVE THE NEW ENDING GRAPHICS!!!!!!! And remember, RRROOOOLLLLLLL Up Your WINDOWS!!!!

I have a kill switch on all our old cars they simply will not crank. Tony is right in the end if somebody really wants your ride they will take it! Thief’s always find a work around lol

I remember having a set of those slender knobs to replace the factory door lock ones. You couldn't use a bent coat hanger to pop the lock. Also had a slim jim for opening locked doors.

I worked at a carwash for years, people would lock their keys in their cars all the time, i would always say i can unlock it.. just don't ask me where i learned to. ha! 😉

Its awesome being a mechanic nowadaysThe one thing that sux is having to have a fortune in tools

early g.m. 3rd gen f bodies are super easy. The side windows get loose from people closing the doors by the glass. you could just pull the glass out towards you, reach in and open the door. crack open the steering column (only tool needed) then remove the locking mechanism on ignition cylinder. start car. got harder once v.a.t. keys came out.

In my younger days I had a habit of locking my keys in the car and got pretty good at breaking into my own vehicle using the method Tony just demonstrated.

The next time Tony stops in for groceries some kid is going to take the Dart for a ride, Ultra Kathy you now have sentry duty when Tony goes shopping.

My old man had his car stolen in the 60's, so he just took the next random car to go look for his 🤣

The key for my '70 Buick started at least four other GMs in my family. And if you put the gear shift level up all the way in Park and held it with pressure with your left hand, you could rotate the igintion ring back and forth slightly and it would eventually turn and start without a key at all.

1969 was the year that GM moved their ignition locks to the column. Prior to that, they were on the dash as you stated. Strattec was the original supplier (back then Briggs and Stratton) of keys and locks to GM (and AMC who often used Saginaw steering columns). Chapman had their hood lock and "total system", it was called "The Insurance Man". Their motto was, "You Can't Beat The System". They were located in Elk Grove, Village, IL. My '80 Trans Am has one, but it hasn't been activated in years. Back in '82, my parents had an '80 Bonneville Brougham coupe that we had just bought from my father's company (it was his company car from new). My dad went to go practice for the upcoming bowling season along with my grandfather and two uncles. After practice, my father came out and said, "Crap, the car is gone". My uncle said, "Wait, I think you parked it over here..." My father said, "Nope, it was here next to the (whatever car was still there....)". Called NYPD, they came to take a report and said, "Forget it Mac. That car is on a barge at the port already. Ya said it had a velour interior. Fahget it, it's gone....there was an "order" out for your car and someone was tailing you for sure....". Never got it back and I'd bet the cop was right.

I had an idea for a different "kill-switch", a valve in the exhaust pipe that leads into the cabin that needs to be shut before driving I can´t see that going wrong in any way ..

I recall one company offering a setup to make your steering wheel detachable (with a simple mod). Of course, this would have one wandering about with their steering wheel when shopping, etc. I still snicker as I remember the 80s and 90s when the cautious driver could be picked out as he was lugging his Benzi Box everywhere he went.

That's the Hilo from the late 60's- early 70's and the next generation is looking for the 30 second pro. Good night my friend and enjoy your weekend Uncle Tony!

When I was a lube tech I had a customer that had the negative leg of the ignition circuit run through a pressure switch in the driver's seat. You had to be ~300lbs to make the contacts close. At 135lbs there was no way I was gonna get it to start but he waited until I started to look worried when it wouldn't start after the oil change. Said he did it to keep his kids from taking the car out at night.

Folks who steal cars are a special kind of low in my mind. You never know who's driving it and if they straight up need that car to support their family. I've heard of folks using quick-release steering wheels and taking them with them or locking then in the truck to help with this issue too