Building a cage to keep critters out.....

[triggerman]

Got a call from a guy who owns a food import business. He has two coolers, 35' X 50' and 60' X 60'. Last weekend somebody stole his condensing units off his roof. Then they cut a hole in the roof and stole most of his wiring and copper tubing. I'm giving him a bid on replacing his refrigeration equipment and would like to bid some cages to protect his new stuff.

Does anybody have any experience building cages to protect equipment from thieves?

LMK

[JonnyTIG]

I don't have any experience building thief-proof cages, but I can offer this. The tube and bar method is saw proof to an extent. Using stainless, build the cage with rolling bars inside of tubes. Stainless can't be cut with oxy equipment, (pocket plasmas aren't around yet) if someone trys to cut through the tubing with a saw, the bar inside the tube will roll when the blade hits it, instead of being cut. Hope this makes sense.

[triggerman]

Thanks Mr. Tig.

[glockdoc]

Some of the economic gurus seem to think that commodity/copper prices will collapse,if they do the problem should go away. Has he considered alarming the equipment? Even just a sign:

SILENT ALARM
YOU LOOT-WE SHOOT

would go a long way and gives the crooks something to think about. Not a good solution if you are in the welding business, though.

As far as cutting SS, it's possible to use the OA torch as a "plasma torch" sort of. The torch gets the metal up to the melting point and the oxy blows it out of the cut. Not pretty, slow, but works on the thinner materials.

[triggerman]

Thanks Doc!

Unfortunately, near downtown Dallas, signs don't work too well. These units are going to have be protected by steel and at best it will only slow them down.

Thanks for the suggestions guys!!

[SkidSteerSteve]

I've built a few trailer locks over the years. One little thing I do is to pin-point the most vulnerable areas and lay a few beads of hardfacing. At least if someone tries to saw through, they will have to have some extra blades with them.

As a side note, we were having a horrible time with that very problem in OKC. The local govt got into it and tightened up the recycling depots. From what I understand, now you have to log your driver's license, tag or some other types of ID. Some HVAC friends of mine say that it is at least slowed down. After all, if you can't sell it, it's just junk. SSS

[nalysale]

Got a call from a guy who owns a food import business. He has two coolers, 35' X 50' and 60' X 60'. Last weekend somebody stole his condensing units off his roof. Then they cut a hole in the roof and stole most of his wiring and copper tubing. I'm giving him a bid on replacing his refrigeration equipment and would like to bid some cages to protect his new stuff.

Does anybody have any experience building cages to protect equipment from thieves?

LMK

Installs the cages around the equipment with several heavy steel bolts that run through the cement that these outside appliances set on.

[High TowerSwamp Anchor]

Put hardsurface with horse shoe borum on it borum has tungstun carbide in it so it will cut in to the pavement so a horse does not slip so easy. It will stop their saw unless they use a chop saw. Then put trip wires in hooked to lights and horns give alot of light and some air horns they to cover noise when they go over the wall!!Fix it up so they will not want to come back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!AT NO PRICE

[Bistineau]

Insulate the cages from ground and wire them up to 240 Volts or 480 Volts with appropriate warning signs and disconnect switch where they can't get to it. I'll bet they won't touch it more than once. They'll pick an easier mark next time(if they survive). Maybe just having it LOOK LIKE it's electrified may work with some. Although I have heard of some people stealing ground wires off powerline poles, till they got hold of one that was energized, that's usually where their copper theft career ends, permanently. Can anyone say Crispy Critters?
An electric fence charger may be all that's needed to deter most theives.