Next on the list. How do you secure your trailer.

My last trailer was protected by its looks. It was ugly, beaten to death, and nobody wanted it. 

The new trailer is not that. It currently has a Master coupler lock that can apparently be picked by an amateur in about 20 seconds or beat off with a sledge in less than that. A little reading says I need something better than this. 

I'm looking at one of these. Not cheap but apparently it's almost uncuttable and very difficult to pick. 

So, what locks do you use to keep your trailer from being stolen? 

So, the tongue locks have always confused me a bit.  What's to stop somebody just dragging it away on the safety chains, or even wrapping their own chain around the hitch and the lock?

Edit: My real answer is, park something in front of it.

Take the wheels off. 

Added benefit, they wont dry rot as quickly if kept inside out of the sun. 

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

You're never going to stop all forms of theft or a committed thief. A tongue lock, as with any lock just keeps honest people honest, and adds an additional hastle so hopefully they steal your neighbors that is unlocked instead of yours.

As mentioned above, if they want it, they'll take it. The more of a hassle than you can make that, the more likely they are to move on to an easier target. You, of course, have to balance that with not making it extra effort for you to use your own trailer. 

Mine is a multi pronged approach.

I use the tongue lock and a lock on the latch. 

There is a 2ft high brick planter directly in front of it (I have to swivel the trailer in) and my camper van parked next to it.

You would have to break into the van, hot wire it, move it, then move my son's car out of the way to gain access.

My wife is retired so during the day when my sons car is gone, she would hear the racket.

Don't forget to put an airtag, tile or whatever cheap tracker your architecture supports. It won't prevent theft but if it does disappear you can hopefully find it.

tomtomgt356 (Tommy) said:

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

You're never going to stop all forms of theft or a committed thief. A tongue lock, as with any lock just keeps honest people honest, and adds an additional hastle so hopefully they steal your neighbors that is unlocked instead of yours.

I started to learn how to pick locks and it really showed me how insecure most things are. Lock don't keep things secure. They slow down or cause people to pick another target as you said. I'd be inclined to park the trailer under a camera with an obvious blinking light.

I don't need to make it impossible to steal, just hard enough to get the vast majority to move on to an easier target. So I'll take reasonable measures, largely keeping honest people honest. Beyond that, that's what insurance is for.

My last trailer had one of these:

It was never stolen, or even attempted, so a confirmation biased success.

Admittedly, the new (to me) trailer with a bigger coupler is still just using my the latch pin lock I use in-transit:

The one that has my attention right now, is the Bolt coupler lock. It costs a little more than the cheapies, but reports to be noticeably more difficult to defeat, while still being far more affordable than the 'maximum security' options.

All actually as-tested here:

Make it obvious

Removing the wheels and a big chain are the best idea. 

For the club trailer, we use an in-cup hitch lock.  Most of the time it's parked with security camera coverage, not that that means too much.

The new trailer is tandem axle.  I should probably invest in a cable lock to put through one pair of wheels.

NONE of them will survive longer than 30 seconds against the cheapest battery powered grinder available.

Consider hiding an AirTag in the trailer. I've helped recover 2 vehicles in the last couple years with these.  (One was worth $120K) The trick is if it's ever stolen, you have to chase it quickly. The AirTag will give notifications to the thief that it exists, and they will get rid of the tag quickly. But if you can chase it right away, you may be able to recover your trailer intact.

In reply to Driven5 :

I can slip that Fastway lock with a piece of a beer can faster than you can open it with a key. 

IMHO the most important factor is where you park it.  Good choices are things like inside a locked garage or behind the fence in the side yard of your house.  Bad choices are out on the street or in the parking lot of a race shop that's closed and deserted at night or on the weekend.  Make sure it's visited frequently -- I saw a post on FB about a stolen trailer where there was a 4 month window of time during which the theft might have happened.

After that, parking another vehicle blocking it in is good, because now they have to steal TWO vehicles to get to it.  You can slow them down a bit more with a good tongue lock (I use one by Proven Industries similar to this) and a good wheel lock like the one SV Rex listed.  Taking the wheels off is viable if you're going to be storing the trailer for a long period of time without using it, but it kinda sucks if you're heading to events twice a month.

Then there's after-its-stolen things like trackers or painting an identifying number on the roof.  IMHO the best option there is simply to buy some good insurance coverage for it -- I use Lockton to get storage/transport/paddock insurance on my race car and there's a rider on the policy that covers the trailer as well.

SV reX said:

NONE of them will survive longer than 30 seconds against the cheapest battery powered grinder available.

Locks are all about slowing crooks down. Having cut a few trailer locks after people misplaced keys, I know how long it usually takes a grinder to remove one.

Grinders is why I was looking at the Altor Icon pictured above. A battery grinder blade will not reach to cut the lock without first cutting large parts of the lock body out of the way. The body is also hardened cast steel and reasonably resistant to sawzall blades as well. The manufacturer claims over 30+ minutes, multiple disk changes, and multiple battery changes to cut the lock with a 5" grinder. In that period of time, even my wife or neighbors will notice something is going on. 

As to parking, it's usually blocked in behind my shop. There are multiple cameras that cover the property. Unfortunately, it's not always sitting at home. That's the situation I'm concerned with. Having left a trailer sitting in a hotel parking lot for several days before I'd like something that will make it pretty obvious that it's being stolen. Hence the question. 

I like the parking boots. I'll have to order a couple of them. 

SV reX said:

In reply to Driven5 :

I can slip that Fastway lock with a piece of a beer can faster than you can open it with a key. 

If you mean the all-steel Bolt unit pictured, care to expand on that? I'm not saying it'll hold up against a grinder. But I've not seen any demonstrations of it being slipped off the way I have seen with typical cast-aluminum Fastway style (also tested in that video) either.

In reply to Driven5 :

I'm referring to the Fastway in the demo video. As he closes it, you can hear the ratchet engaging. The only thing it takes to slip that style lock is a thin piece of sheet metal slipped into the ratchet mechanism. No cutting required. 

In reply to Toyman! :

I agree. It's completely about slowing crooks down. That's why removing the wheels is the best insurance. 
 

They tow really slowly without wheels. 😉

In reply to SV reX :

Taking the wheels off and parking things in front of the trailer is my go-to long storage solution.
 

I had a trailer that was being "impounded" in a sense. I unbolted the coupler from the tongue. Only took me 5 minutes and I knew nobody would have a quick solution to that. 

My trailer is so ugly no one will take it, and if they do I'll probably get more for it than selling it.

Toyman! said:

I'd like something that will make it pretty obvious that it's being stolen. Hence the question. 

Someone needs to invent/market a hidden 110db siren that only turns on after they hit ~40mph. 

Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) said:

Toyman! said:

I'd like something that will make it pretty obvious that it's being stolen. Hence the question. 

Someone needs to invent/market a hidden 110db siren that only turns on after they hit ~40mph. 

Add some flashing red and blue LEDs so they'll get stopped extra quick.

Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) said:

Toyman! said:

I'd like something that will make it pretty obvious that it's being stolen. Hence the question. 

Someone needs to invent/market a hidden 110db siren that only turns on after they hit ~40mph. 

I use a combination of a coupler latch lock, a coupler lock, a cable lock that goes through the wheels on one side an alarm with a motion activator the applies the brakes and sounds a hidden and exposed siren when activated.  I also park the trailer in view of a couple of the security cameras with the electric jack cranked up high and the power turned off inside the trailer.

None of the locks would be particularly difficult to defeat but the hope is that having to mess with three of them in front of the cameras is enough of a deterrent to make potential thieves look elsewhere.

The trailer and it's contents are also well insured.