Wheels Stolen :(

zen63

I wonder can anyone give me some advice?

I woke up this morning to find my car sitting on bricks, some skumbag having stolen the alloys. Its a BMW Z4 so the alloys are painfully expensive.

Does anyone know what effect this will have on my fully comp insurance - its with Hibernian?

Thanks

Zen

Im off skumbag hunting

fletch

OMG did you not have locking wheel nuts? Some people really are scum these days....my Mam was tellin me, a priest she knows had to put a big cage around the oil tank for the Church because people kept drivin up to it and empying it!

zen63

No locking wheel nuts

To be honest I would never have thought that the wheels would be a target - more fool me! The new wheels will have locking nuts though

fletch

I'm amazed that locking wheel nuts didn't come as standard......they do on most new cars with alloys...

zen63

I had asked bolands in waterford to fit them when she arrived, but when i got into the car it was the last thing on my mind - too much fun driving her. Any one know about the insurance for something like this?

Hibernian see to only have a message service on the weekends

Seth Brundle

Sorry to hear that. I guess that if you claim off your insurance then it will affect your NCB.
Try ebay for a 2nd hand set.

I have two sets of locknuts on my wheels - a BMW set and one from halfords (McGard Standard or possibly McGard Ultra - http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/product_test/48339/locking_wheel_bolts.html)

Seth Brundle

Actually just thinking - didn't your alarm go off? The tilt sensor should have activated the alarm when the ba**ards jacked it up. if it didn't i would make a lot of noise to your dealer.
I would also get the underside of the car checked as these guys wouldn't have used much TLC in jacking it up and also where the blocks went.

kensutz

Zen there's been a lot of cars which had their wheels stolen in the past week. Even where I work, a car ended up with one wheel missing in the car park.

Anan1

Sorry to hear that, Zen. I'm not sure whether it's worth the hassle, but you might keep an eye on the b&s over the next while. You say the dealer fitted them - if they're unusual rims, then you might be lucky enough to recognize them if they come up for sale. In that case, a quick call to the guards...

Ernie Ball

What next?!

What a drag, Zen. I'm feeling your pain.

Guess I'll be buying locking wheel nuts this week.

Dave!

Jayzus, some people'd rob the milk outa yer tea!

Scumbags.

Hope it works out okay for ye

zen63

Update: The Guards came to dust the car for prints but no joy

BMW assist have been great, they have arranged to get other wheels put on the car and deliver it to the local dealer. They are also giving me a replacement while it gets fixed (lol probaby something slow)

I have no idea why the alarm did not go off, it has the factory fitted one, but this might just be for internal intrusion?

I am less than pleased with Hibernian especially not being able to get any information over the weekend - and I have yet to hear about my NCD. I think the extra twist of the knife may come on monday morning, when I call them. I'll update when i get more info.

Spitfire666

I've seen this happen alot lately. a guy near were I work has been robbed twice and for some strange reason they only took one rear wheel on both occasions. I'm buying a 206 next week (2nd hand) and I'm going to get my alloys a few days later but i'm going str8 to halfords as soon as I get the car and i'm tempted to buy 4sets of lock nuts so that all 16 nuts will be lock nuts.
Last thing I need is a grands worth of alloys stolen.

Big Balls

You *should* be covered without losing your NCB.

It's the same as if someone stole your car, unless you left your keys in the ignition with a big sign saying "steal me" on it, they have to replace the car to whatever value it's worth, unless it's less than a year old of course in which case they replace the car with a like for like model.

Not sure I would tell Hibernian you had no locking nuts though

Big Balls

Spitfire666 wrote:

I've seen this happen alot lately. a guy near were I work has been robbed twice and for some strange reason they only took one rear wheel on both occasions. I'm buying a 206 next week (2nd hand) and I'm going to get my alloys a few days later but i'm going str8 to halfords as soon as I get the car and i'm tempted to buy 4sets of lock nuts so that all 16 nuts will be lock nuts.
Last thing I need is a grands worth of alloys stolen.

Halfords? You mad?

All they have to do is go in and buy a set from there too and they can take your wheels.

Buy some online which are a lot more unusual/hard to get.

Anan1

I think any wheel nuts can be drilled, given time.

Litcagral

Anan1 wrote:

I think any wheel nuts can be drilled, given time.

I've heard of thieves welding a regular nut to the locking nut and taking it off as normal but I doubt if anyone would go to this much hassle (and noise).

Spitfire666

any wheel nut can be removed but the thing is it takes longer and so increases the chances of getting caught therefore lowering the appeal to a thieving scumbag.
I know I said halfords but i didnt actualy mean i was going to halfords,i just ment im going to get lock nuts str8 away.
Halfords was mentioned in the thread thats why i said it.

fletch

Halfords also sell a locking wheel nut remover :rolleyes: .....kinda a reversed threaded nut that sits over the lockin wheel nut and grips it to remove it.....will only work on nuts that are quite exposed tho

Litcagral

For the real belt and braces security get 4 different locking nut sets and put 4 different ones on each wheel.

Do the more expensive sets have more combinations? I priced a set recently and they were €80 - seemed a bit steep.

Alfasudcrazy

On my 318iS coupe I recall that it had one nut on each wheel that needed some adaptor to get it off. The adaptor was in the tool kit for the car.

I suppose if someone had that adaptor though it would not be much good to protect the wheels.:rolleyes:

Litcagral

Alfasudcrazy wrote:

On my 318iS coupe I recall that it had one nut on each wheel that needed some adaptor to get it off. The adaptor was in the tool kit for the car.

I suppose if someone had that adaptor though it would not be much good to protect the wheels.:rolleyes:

They're supposed to have a variety of combinations just like a lock.

5500

Big Balls wrote:

Halfords? You mad?

All they have to do is go in and buy a set from there too and they can take your wheels.

Not true,manufacturers have thousands of different thread's,a socket from another set of the same make wont open them.

@ The Op - how much are Bmw charging for the replacement wheels?also do you know what size they are?

Barr

zen63 wrote:

I am less than pleased with Hibernian especially not being able to get any information over the weekend - and I have yet to hear about my NCD. I think the extra twist of the knife may come on monday morning, when I call them. I'll update when i get more info.

Indeed this is the case with hibernian, they only have a notification system during the weekend which is not manned by hibernian employees thus they won't have a clue whats covered or not !

With all hibernian motor products i.e motorchoice and brokerline policies , you are covered for fire and theft without it effecting your NCB.
There is also no excess to pay with theft claims!

If you have a policy booklet to hand you will see where alloys are covered , check out events insured Section 1 Loss or damage to the car.

With regard to not having locking nuts this is not a requirement for an insurance company and you should be covered.

For the alarm going off , as far as I know you would need motion sensors which are not fitted to most alarms systems nowadays as they just set the alarm off whenever there was movement in the car , like a strong wind or another car passing in close proximity.This is what my alarm guy told me when I got my 18's fitted so I could be corrected here.

HTH

Fey!

By any chance do you have a picture of the car - someone might spot them somewhere. Also, what tyres were on them (make/size/spec) and what mileage was on the tyres? Had the wheels any kerbing/scuffing/scratches? Were the wheels the same size front and back (ie, the backs may have been 9.5j whilst the fronts may have been 8.5j)

They're all details that might make your goods recognisable.

Sorry to hear about your loss. As someone said earlier, talk to the dealer /BMW Ireland about the lack of locking nuts and the fact that the alarm didn't activate - maybe you'll have some luck with them. I wouldn't hold my breath on the insurance company being helpful, though.

BTW - I came across a link to this on www.bmwcarclubireland.com - at least it's being circulated!

Spitfire666

Litcagral wrote:

For the real belt and braces security get 4 different locking nut sets and put 4 different ones on each wheel.

Do the more expensive sets have more combinations? I priced a set recently and they were €80 - seemed a bit steep.

Thats exactly what i ment in my first post

Theres no protection for a car thats 100%.
My dad used to work up beside cargocare near the airport and one of the lads in there bought this brand new jeep fully loaded with all kinds of everything and he spared no expense kitting it out with every security device he could and one night he left it there and when he arrived in the morning it was gone with no sign it had ever been there....i.e. no broken glass no burnt rubber etc.
when they checked out the cctv footage the saw a few lads backing in with a low loader similir to what the clampers used (with the crain on it) and as casualy as they liked, lifting the jeep onto the back and driving away as if it was nothing. It was never seen again.
If I can remember correctly....it was thought they had been watching the place and then stolen the loader to steal the jeep.

Bikes are even easier, the lift it into a refridgerated truck and then they can do what they like coz even if it has a tracker,it cant be picked up inside the fridge unit.

coolhandluke

Spitfire666 wrote:

Theres no protection for a car thats 100%.
My dad used to work up beside cargocare near the airport and one of the lads in there bought this brand new jeep fully loaded with all kinds of everything and he spared no expense kitting it out with every security device he could and one night he left it there and when he arrived in the morning it was gone with no sign it had ever been there....i.e. no broken glass no burnt rubber etc.
when they checked out the cctv footage the saw a few lads backing in with a low loader similir to what the clampers used (with the crain on it) and as casualy as they liked, lifting the jeep onto the back and driving away as if it was nothing. It was never seen again.
If I can remember correctly....it was thought they had been watching the place and then stolen the loader to steal the jeep.

Bikes are even easier, the lift it into a refridgerated truck and then they can do what they like coz even if it has a tracker,it cant be picked up inside the fridge unit.

A bloke i know,his jeep was robbed the same way,these boys have some neck.
He parked in a shopping centre car pk,went in to do the shopping came out and the jeep was gone.When the cctv was checked it was seen going out of the carpark on a lowloader/breakdown recovery truck.:eek:

zen63

Thanks for all the replys!

The alloys are 225/40/18 on the front and 255/35/18 on the rear and they are runflat (will be changed now) bridgestones. They have maybe 9000k miles on them.

As for marks they have very minor kerbing on all of them - but nothing else.

They are these ones so they would look out of place on most other BMW cars:

zen63

Thanks Kbannon for the mention on the bmwclub forum!

Squirrel

Sorry to hear about your wheels man, but about the lock-nuts, did I not read on another thread a while back that you should only have 1 lock-nut on each wheel due to them not being as tight on the wheel or something. I think it could have been in another thread or I'm imagining it

5500

Squirrel wrote:

Sorry to hear about your wheels man, but about the lock-nuts, did I not read on another thread a while back that you should only have 1 lock-nut on each wheel due to them not being as tight on the wheel or something. I think it could have been in another thread or I'm imagining it

Yep the locknut manufacturers reccomend only 1 nut per wheel,like you said there not as tight

fletch

eireal wrote:

Yep the locknut manufacturers reccomend only 1 nut per wheel,like you said there not as tight

I use a torque wrench to set all my nuts at the same pressure.....how can this be

Squirrel

fletch wrote:

I use a torque wrench to set all my nuts at the same pressure.....how can this be

Could be the shape of the nut compared to the wheel. I don't have a clue to be honest, I just remembered reading it on another thread

fletch

Squirrel wrote:

Could be the shape of the nut compared to the wheel. I don't have a clue to be honest, I just remembered reading it on another thread

Does anybody else use a torque wrench to set their nuts to the correct pressure....I set mine as per manufacturers guidelines and you would be surprised how loose they actually are meant to be! Anytime I get any work done on my wheels, first thing I do when I get home is loosen all the nuts and tighten using the torque wrench.

fletch

In relation to locking nuts not being as tight as regular nuts, I emailed a leading supplier asking them to verify same. Here's the response I got

Dear <insert my name>,

Thank you very much for your interest in our company and our high quality <supplier> wheel locks.

To give you the best information regarding your request we need to know the exact application

which you are asking for.

As we are delivering more than 30 car manufacturers as original equipment we can confirm that

due to the manufacturer’s specifications the <supplier> locking wheel nuts must have the same

measurements than the original fasteners.

In our Aftermarket product range there might be the possibility that the <supplier> wheel locks

differs in comparison to the original fasteners.

I hope that this will be of help to you.

If you have any further question please do not hesitate to contact me.

Best Regards

Doesn't really answer the question.

Seth Brundle

fletch wrote:

Does anybody else use a torque wrench to set their nuts to the correct pressure....

my nuts are under no pressure - as for my wheel bolts, my torque wrench got nicked recently but I guess my answer would be yes

fletch wrote:

I set mine as per manufacturers guidelines and you would be surprised how loose they actually are meant to be! Anytime I get any work done on my wheels, first thing I do when I get home is loosen all the nuts and tighten using the torque wrench.

one purpose of tightening them to the correct torque is to avoid damage to the wheel (especially with alloys). If Mr. Kwikfit air gunned them on to a higher torque setting he may well have damaged them by the time you get home.

zen63

Update:

No joy from the police, but i never expected there to be.

Hibernian have confirmed that they will cover the bill and that it will not affect my NCB - Thank God!

The bill totalled 2575euro, I opted for non-runflat tyres as the RFTs are pretty rubbish in Ireland. So that saved a healthy amount. I have also had locking wheel nuts fitted!

Overall, BMW assist were exceptionally good in handling the problem - they literally did everything for me, and even ensured that once I needed the hire car from longer than covered in their policy - that it was at a vastly reduced rate. Hibernian were good, I just got the impression one hand didnt know what the other was doing.

That being said the experience was not completly painfull, and a lot easier than I had expected.

Thanks for all your replys

blahblah06

WOW there expensive wheels. at least ya got it sorted without effecting your insurance

5500

What size were the original wheels?

zen63

18 Inchers - the really strange thing is that they cost must more as an upgrade when the car was new, than they do as a service part - interesting that huh?

I will bear that in mind the next time i consider BMW optional extras.

Seth Brundle

I think VRT applies to extras when buying a new car but if they are bought afterwards then VRT doesn't apply.

5500

There still fairly expensive,if you liked your bling you could pick up 20" chrome wheels with tyres and have change for locknuts from the insurance payout!