Trackers

[Ali C]

Who is the besr company and do you have to pay a yearly payment,don`t know much about trackers so can somebody please enlighten me :confused:

[whitebakecase]

the ones my employers use are called NAVMAN, however i'm not sure if there for business use only, the transmitter is on 24/7 and logs every move on the office PC, there is a subscription to pay, not sure how much, have you tried the tracker website?

[mattdavidson81]

Hiya matey, I would go for the RAC trackstar one here:

http://www.ractrackstar.co.uk/index.aspx

This one is a GPS system, if the car is stolen, even without your knowledge, an RAC Trackstar operator will phone the police and can give them up to the second information about the exact location of your car. You pay £299 hardware, £10 per month, £30 per quarter or £120 per annum. Or you could pay £325 for as ong as you own the car. Installation charge is extra.

If you look here:

http://www.uktracking.com/uktracking/

You will see tracker monitor and tracker retrieve. The tracker montior one is permenantly operating, and instantly sends out a signal to the receivers once the car has been illegally moved. The tracker retrieve one required you to see that you car has been stolen and phone tracker, whereas the monitor one, they ring you to check to see if its supposed to be moving!

The difference between these 2 systems is the way they work. RAC is GPS whereas the other 2 emmit radio signals. The RAC one might not work if it was scooped straight into a crate, whereas the Tracker one would. However, the RAC one locates the vehicle in live time, with pinoint accuracy, whereas for the tracker to work, there has to be a police vehice within about 2 miles of the stolen car, and then its only located by the officer following which direction the signal is coming from. Its pretty hard, trust me! And also, only area cars (1 per area) have these receivers fitted in our constabulary (hampshire.) You need firstly the police car to be in range by chance, and secondy for there to actually be a police officer in the car to pick up the activation, which isnt always the case.

As the prices are pretty much the same, i woud go for the RAC one. Yeah it wont work in a crate or under a bridge, but I reckon because of the accuracy, you've got a better chance of getting it back before they get chance to think about doing that!

Apparently Cobra have or will be bringout out a rival system. Cant seem to find much detail on that at the moment.

Hope this helps a bit.

Matt

[ap0gee1978]

I have Tracker Monitor fitted in mine, partly because I had it in my last car fitted as part of an alarm/tracker package from Toad, and partly because Old Bill have Tracker equipment fitted in their cars and helicopters, and so they can trace your car directly. All the other systems rely on one of the tracking device company's operators liaising with the police control room, who then have to direct the police officers to wherever your car is. OK if it's hidden away somewhere not moving, but far too complicated IMO if your car was being driven about the place at high speed. If you want a bit of both, the Tracker Horizon has both GPS and radio systems, so the device people can see where your car is, and the police can follow it in real time. It is quite a bit more expensive, though.

At the end of the day, the Tracker Monitor / Retrieve system is actually older technology than the RAC Trackstar / Tracker Horizon, but because of the real-time tracking capability for the police, it's my preferred choice. Plus, IIRC it's the police's favourite system, as they get to play James Bond!

Oh, BTW, as far as subscriptions go, with Tracker you pay either an annual sub of about £100, or a one-off sub of about £350 (IIRC) to cover you for as long as you own the car. Obviously, if you plan to keep it for more than three years, you're better off with the one-off payment...

[mattdavidson81]

All the other systems rely on one of the tracking device company's operators liaising with the police control room, who then have to direct the police officers to wherever your car is. OK if it's hidden away somewhere not moving, but far too complicated IMO if your car was being driven about the place at high speed

Yeah but the info is still in live time. The police controller would be on the phone to the tracker operator getting live updates from them which are passed immediately to the police officers. They can just say 'Car is travelling on the hith street now,' that passed straight to the police officers. Much quicker and easier than looking at a tiny screen trying to figure out what roads might be in the direction that the signal is coming from and then trying to figure out how far it is away. And thats only if the car is not moving. Get it on the move and you might never know which road the car is on! Trust me, I've done it and its hard! You can be right on top of it according to the display but just be the wrong side of a fence with a 2 mile round trip to the right road. GPS is far more accurate. I have seen police directed to stolen vehicles on the move with so much ease!

If it was me, I would still go with the RAC GPS ones. Like I said earlier, the car would need to be within range (about 2 miles) of a police car, which has a police officer in it, and the chances of that arent great. And then it has to be a car that actually has the equipment. Our traffic cars dont anymore. Only area cars, and theres 1 in my police area, which is about 35 square miles.

Matt