Greeny lunatics are creeping round letting people's tyres down. What's needed is something that will alert the car owner the instant a tyre valve cap is unscrewed. It has to be when the cap is turned because otherwise it's too late. Ideas please!
If the existence of alarms causes the ecofascists to deflate tyres by damaging them they will be committing criminal damage. As it is, just letting tyres down isn't a crime.
Bill
There exist air-less tyres. But they may not currently meet road regulations.
Paul
I think it could be argued that it *is*
If the police have told you it's not a criminal offence I'd ask them to think again and perhaps consult the CPS.
Criminal damage doesn't require damage that is physical or permanent. The courts have held it includes temporary loss of usefulness.
Then there's common law "public nuisance". The police may be disinclined to that as it's one of the ones where courts have held the right to protest often provides an excuse.
Failing all that, report it as a non-crime hate incident given South Yorks Police famously keen to deal with those :)
Friend had this done to their pushbike regularly. Ink in the valve stem under the valve cap identified the culprit...
This may be a detterent here?
Thomas Prufer
It is also criminal damage if there is recklessness as to whether damage will occur, which is certainly likely to happen if somebody drives off with a deflated tyre.
You sure about that?
Is the valve made of metal? If so one needs a device a bit like those on touch switches for a light. Trouble is of course, the spurious triggers from static rain etc. I know that can be a thing as I once made a rain detector out of one, but it only worked if there was a thunderstorm about.
Brian
They put leaflets on the windscreens to alert drivers so I think recklessness as regards that would be a stretch.
Putting leaflets on windows is also an admission that they know they have caused criminal damage.
The arrogance of these protestors is staggering: whether they are climate-change activists, anti-roads activists, anti-meat-eating/farming activists or whatever, they are losing a lot of support by trying to foist their own views on the rest of the population. Do they really think that by preventing people driving somewhere or eating meat, they will actually endear themselves to the population and persuade them to change their ways? Anyone who prevents me doing something legal or who pesters me in any way gets added to my mental "never do business with them" list, so their protest is counter-productive.
The most scary person I ever encountered in an eventful life was an anti-animal cruelty protestor screaming 'murderers'. Complete psycho and capable of anything I'd say.
Not an alert as such but grease mixed with ink on the valve cover cap might be a deterrent.
Something like a miniature locking wheel nut cover?
You used to be able to get them to go on wheel nuts some years ago.
They'd just superglue them ...
They'd have to be careful not to superglue themselves to the tyre tho!
There are a couple things wrong with your idea, I'm afraid.
It's inconvenient having to pump the tyres up again, but it's a hell of a lot quicker and cheaper than replacing them because they have been spiked.
Letting the tyres down is actually criminal damage. It's hard to get the police to act, but that's probably because there's usually no way of identifying the culprit.
OK, so reckless as to whether having the weight of the car bear down on a deflated tyre might damage it. In any case, putting leaflets on windscreens is also criminal damage.
ISTM that an even more useful invention would be a tyre valve that only lets air out so long as the internal pressure in the tyre was above the correct inflation pressure.
You can buy indicator valve caps, which show whether a tyre is under or over inflated, so one which releases excess pressure would not be that difficult to design.
A slight modification to the valve would make it spray a wide pattern - put orange cash machine dye in the tyre. Remember to use something to deflect the spray if you need to let down your own tyre for any reason!
It would get you lynched at KwikFit, if you forgot to mention that feature. :)
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