Tailgate thieves

Been a thing for a while. A friend's brother of mine got his 2nd gen Tacoma tailgate stolen at Nevada back at around 2010.

New complete tailgates from the dealership costs thousands of dollars. The thieves will just list them for around $500 or so then viola, easy sale and sizable profit.

Hate to admit it, but thieves can be rather clever. Not a Tacoma, but I do know a guy who got his parts stolen off his '08 Honda S2000 CR through a thief cutting a hole into his garage.

 

It’s a self maintaining market, steal a tailgate and then those people have to buy another one.

 

This is a somewhat common tactic on high end mountain bikes. Put your name and phone number on a post it note, roll it up, and tuck it in the handlebar end under the grip. If stolen and recovered, makes it easy to prove it's yours.

 

The video says $4,000 for truck repairs (after a scumbag drilled into her gas tank). WTF.. is that SoCal dealer prices.

 

…for DIY incompetent women and men only. I bought a $9 tank repair patch kit from True Value to fix my 1st gen’s tank when it got drilled. It was a permanent fix that lasted another 100k miles and probably still is after I sold the truck. I haven’t had to try them yet (hopefully never), but I see that they sell plastic tank repair kits now also and wouldn’t be afraid to try it.

 

I also hid a couple Air Tags in my truck after I removed their speaker.

 

Glue one to the inside of the tailgate for good measure.

 

I have a Sabelco lock plus a locking Rig’d swing gate in front of it, it’ll be really hard to steal that way as you can’t even open it.

 

Better not see any tailgates in this post!!

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/socal-garage-sale-miscellaneous-2nd-gen-things.858675/

Seriously - sorry that this happened. Usually we put locks on tailgates to prevent theft of what is inside.

“Well, the times, they are a changin”…

 

Sad part is I think he had a locking tailgate. Probably just never thought about it

 

Your insurance will gladly cover the bill for another tailgate after they take out your deductible...and then your rates will go up for 3 years.

 

Better off trying to find the stolen one and buying it off the thieves

 

Instead of the tailgate thefts slowing down it seems the thieves are getting gutsy.

 

Probably just get a slap on the wrist here nowadays

 

They are about $500-$600 new. So they are making money selling them on ebay.

 

Sorry, the police have “bigger” crimes to worry about. They ain’t gonna spend 2 secs looking for this.

keep your tailgate locked 110% of the time and back into places where your tailgate cannot be opened to ensure it doesn’t get swiped.

 

Yea I agree. Lesson learned, now he doesn’t want to replace it but wants to settle for a temporary option

 

Told him they would just steal this too

 

Cheapest fix is buy one of those but use it when needed only..otherwise keep it locked up in the cab.

 

I lock with the key And I also did the tailgate mod lock buying the hose clamp. Sorry this happened to you guys.