Tractors: anti-theft systems and technologies

The theft of farm tractors as well as earthmoving and other construction machinery has recently risen sharply. There is a wide range of methods and devices for defense against theft

Theft no longer makes the news. Not a day goes by without farm tractors getting stolen along with all other types of machinery. Moreover, diesel fuel, costly plant treatment products and other valuable goods go missing and farming enterprises do not know how to defend themselves. For some time now the countryside has become a place where thefts are ongoing.

In this worrisome setting, there is no doubt that the machine with the greatest value which gets stolen most frequency is the tractor; basically, this is because this is the machine which far and away has the biggest market. Obviously there are no certainties but it is presumed that in most cases stolen tractors are quickly shipped abroad to be dismantled for use as a source of components as spare parts or are put to work tout court on a remote farm.

In fact, the presumption is that the final destinations of stolen items are mainly the countries of Eastern Europe or North Africa. This means that the prospects for regaining possession of the machine with relative certainty would be only before it crosses national borders because even if its location is known, through GPS tracking for example, a recovery procedure becomes much more difficult. 

 

Ways of stealing

Unfortunately there are many ways to steal a tractor and by now those who do so are real professionals who perfectly understand the technologies applied to counter theft and are capable of neutralizing them. What can be done, often with great efficiency, is to make their work difficult and complicated with the hope that they will give up. 

The most obvious occurrence, and unfortunately perhaps the most frequent, is that the thief simply climbs abroad the tractor and drives it away, maybe even with the key still in the ignition. A classic example is when the tractor is left running on the edge of a field coupled to an irrigation pump drawing water from a ditch. In any case, this is a situation which is easy to avoid, either with a commercial mechanical or electronic anti-theft device as well as with a homemade remedy such as removing the main fuse or disconnecting the battery to prevent the tractor from starting. 

At a higher level, the tractor is hitched to another one and towed away. A good way to avoid this risk is to leave the front wheels of the tractor at their maximum turning radius to make it difficult to tow in a straight line so that it can only be dragged, obviously with great difficulty.

The most drastic case is obviously loading a tractor on a flatbed truck. It can be said that this case involves an organization with the right equipment but to counter even this predicament there are remedies which can be applied.

 

Above all, the keys (and ignition lock)

Agriculture tractors are started up with their keys just as are automobiles and other vehicles on the road. But ignitions for cars and other vehicles have undergone an important technological evolution whereas tractors, in most cases, have remained elementary, with no basic anti-theft feature. Up until a few years ago, it was even normal to have the same key for an entire production run from any given manufacturer or, at most, the same key for a given range of tractors. Fortunately, this state of affairs is changing for tractors as well. There are, for example, manufacturers of high powered tractors which supply coded keys. For extremely valuable units costing tens of thousands of euro, it should be strongly hoped that manufacturers would provide them with ignition lock cylinders or keyless ignitions as standard equipment for a first level safety device, not only to deter straightforward theft but to stop fraudulent use without clear authorization.

 

Mechanical anti-theft devices

The fundamental components of a tractor can be worked on: the hydraulic plant and/or controls of clutch, brakes, steering, gearbox, etc. This is the function, for example, of the Mech Lock System from Mattaze in the Province of Como which limits hydraulic flow in one direction. When the engine is started the system operates on the pedals sending oil under pressure but does not return it to take the pedals out of use, making it impossible to drive the tractor.  

Obviously the key which activates the mechanism cannot be copied or cloned. The cylinder cannot be drilled into or broken; the only way to bypass this anti-theft devise is to damage it but at this point the vehicle would not be usable. The same solution can be mounted on the hydraulic or compressed air circuit; in this case, the wheels are blocked and the machine stays in neutral. As an alternative, or for something additional, there is a so-called block-shaft device which originated with automotive technology but is available for most tractors on the market. This type of device operates physically on the hydraulic cylinder rod which turns the front wheels to the maximum extent of the turning radius making it impossible to drive the machine, and also raises a considerable problem for any possibility of towing it. The Block Stem built in Monopoli in the Bari Province is this type of device for agricultural tractors which turns out to be especially effective for high powered machines and thus very heavy. In these cases the device is very efficient thanks to the difficulty of lifting the rear wheels to shift the machine. However, this anti-theft device is useless if the tractor is loaded directly to a big flatbed truck. 

It must be said that in this case those intending to steal the tractor must be outfitted with special equipment and have the time needed to carry out their operation. Similarly, the Tecnoblock from Piacenza is marketing an agricultural machinery anti-theft solution which acts on the clutch and/or the brakes hydraulic and/or compressed air circuit and on the hand brake and, electrically, on the ignition of the vehicle. Once the device is mounted, the tractor cannot be started, the transmission remains blocked after depressing the clutch pedal and the vehicle remains stationary after trying the brake pedal. Another option is for the totally mechanical block of all the fundamental tractor controls, such as the gear shift or the steering wheel.

Moreover, it is possible to blind the electronic CPU in its housing to stop it from being replaced by one which is not coded.

 

Electronic anti-theft devices

A distinction must be drawn between the two general categories of these devices, that is, the immobilizer which prevents starting the vehicle and the satellite anti-theft device which signals the location of the vehicle and certain functions it performs automatically or performed on it. Satellite anti-theft devices for farm tractors are undoubtedly preferred because they generally provide numerous alarm options. The examples are if the machine is moved, lifted, taken to a different location, exceeds a certain speed, etc. Moreover, in the case of one of these events, this can be verified via a mobile phone message for the visualization of the tractor’s location. Localization services may or may not charge a subscription fee.

As for automobiles, these circuits can enact an anti-intrusion system and activate operations; in practice, if a certain event occurs, the engine can be blocked or, on the other hand, the device can be disactivated in case of a false alarm.

VDO is a trademark of the Continental Group which brought the VDO Easy to the market last year. This passive and active satellite anti-theft device can be personalized for programming a location function and apply the engine block if the machine is moved from this location. Among other features to deploy are real-time control of the functional state of the machine by monitoring temperature and power consumption and monitoring an accident event. 

An alternative satellite anti-theft device is based on coded RF (radio frequency) signals transmitted to law enforcement receivers. The advantage provided with this device is that it works also when there is no satellite coverage available, as would be the case in a heavily wooded area or an underground parking garage. Among these producers is the multinational LoJack, with a subsidiary in Milan which markets the product also for the most robust and durable agricultural machinery built to withstand all environmental conditions and perform the most demanding operations.

 

Homemade anti-theft measures

Sometimes creativity turns out to to be the best anti-theft device. There is an infinite number of homemade solutions and they are strengthened if they are kept secret, known only to the individual who developed them. One of the most simple and immediate solutions is the removal of tractor components such as the battery, the main fuse, cables, CPUs. The trouble is that they must all be correctly replaced and this poses a problem if there is little time or the components to remove are not easily accessible.

Another method, sometimes activated involuntarily, is to leave the tractor hitched to an implement which makes an attempt to steal it a more troublesome and noisy job. On the same issue, leaving the tractor in a dark shed difficult to enter with, scrap iron carefully spread around or perhaps attached to the machine with a cable difficult to see, would force any thief to make considerable noise simply by approaching the tractor. Yet another solution could be to mount locks on the door and windows of the structure in which the tractor is parked.