Flashlight saves the life of ... my mailbox! :)

A couple of juvenile delinquents were out driving around in their pickup last night, apparently blowing up mailboxes with what I presume were M-80s or similar explosive. I was outside trying to catch a glimpse of our resident hog-nosed skunk "flower" and had heard a couple of distant "booms," with each one slightly louder than the last. Note that the occasional gunshot is not uncommon out in our area, so I didn't really pay close attention until I saw a truck drive up to a point right around where our mailbox is located (it was dark at this point, so I couldn't tell for sure.) It paused for 5 or 10 seconds with the headlights out but the parking lights on, so I grabbed my trusty K.I. (upgraded to U bin) and lit him up from approximately 500 ft. away. The light was not sufficient for me to actually get a good glimpse of the vehicle, but had the desired effect. I heard one of the passengers shout "go! go! go! go!" and the truck quickly took off. If this happens only a hundred or so more times, the light will have paid for itself!

I hear ya!! I had a similar thing to happen to me, well my wife. She was awakend to the neighbors mailbox getting smashed at 2 am. Instead of waking me up she takes off out the door with, of all my bright lights, the E1l is what she grabbed!!!??


She spooked them off, but I jumped her butt about running out the door in the middle of the night and not wakeing me up first! Oh yea, I gave her a lecture about which light to take outside for "noises" and investigating them.

I wish someone would put a mailbox made of concrete out when these idiots run around doing this. I'd love to see those punks' faces when they take a swing at that!

GalvanickLucifer said:

If this happens only a hundred or so more times, the light will have paid for itself!

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Your brain is functioning on a higher plane along side the Great Thinkers of humanity - Aristotle, Da Vinci, Einstein, Paul Rubens (Peewee Herman, not the 16th Century Flemish painter), and Powernoodle. You are a true Flashaholic.

Well done.

cheers

Good going!

At my last place there was a problem with someone taking out every single mailbox on the street by the simple expedient of running them down with a big truck. This happened about every two weeks. The third time I built a mailbox holder out of railroad rails concreted into the ground and a rebar cage over the mailboxes themselves. Too much overkill is almost enough, I'm tellin ya(I may make that my signature). The fourth time Mr. Mailbox Murderer came out to play, that contraption tore the front axle off his truck. Dumb kid was 14 years old(no license, truck wasn't even registered/insured for road use) and daddy was not too pleased to hear about what his son had been doing with the family farm truck.

Got told a couple months later that my mailbox holder violated some county ordinance and had to take it down. Was a *serious* PITA to dismantle, too.

Disclaimer:
I don't recommend anyone else do this. I've posted it because I think some of you will find it amusing, I don't suggest anyone else follow my course of action. The person taking out mailboxes drove fairly slow(he had to miss telephone poles and whatnot else). I probably wouldn't have done this had he driven fast, and I banked on the ASSumption that he would continue driving slow. Had the kid gotten hurt I'm sure I would have gotten sued, even though there were reflectors all over the thing and him hitting anything not on the road was completely and totally his fault.


Cheers all! :buddies:

Diesel_Bomber said:

Got told a couple months later that my mailbox holder violated some county ordinance and had to take it down. Was a *serious* PITA to dismantle, too.

Disclaimer:
I don't recommend anyone else do this. I've posted it because I think some of you will find it amusing, I don't suggest anyone else follow my course of action. The person taking out mailboxes drove fairly slow(he had to miss telephone poles and whatnot else). I probably wouldn't have done this had he driven fast, and I banked on the ASSumption that he would continue driving slow. Had the kid gotten hurt I'm sure I would have gotten sued, even though there were reflectors all over the thing and him hitting anything not on the road was completely and totally his fault.


Cheers all! :buddies:

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Quite a few years ago, one of our family friends found a kinder, gentler, way to deal with a similar problem. In line with his mailbox, he sank a row of 3" OD heavy wall galvanized steel pipes into concrete footings, leaving about 12" of pipe above ground level. When his neighborhood's young vandal showed up for another round of mischief, he ended up ripping the oil pan off of his car's engine, but nothing else was damaged and nobody was hurt. Naturally, young Einstein floored it trying to get away, and of course he didn't get far. The cops found his car abandoned by the side of the road with a siezed engine. Another father was less than pleased with his son's antics, but our friend just got smiles from the county deputies. As far as I know, his pipes are still there.
:lolsign:

LedSled said:

Quite a few years ago, one of our family friends found a kinder, gentler, way to deal with a similar problem. In line with his mailbox, he sank a row of 3" OD heavy wall galvanized steel pipes into concrete footings, leaving about 12" of pipe above ground level. When his neighborhood's young vandal showed up for another round of mischief, he ended up ripping the oil pan off of his car's engine, but nothing else was damaged and nobody was hurt. Naturally, young Einstein floored it trying to get away, and of course he didn't get far. The cops found his car abandoned by the side of the road with a siezed engine. Another father was less than pleased with his son's antics, but our friend just got smiles from the county deputies. As far as I know, his pipes are still there.
:lolsign:

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Good thinking! I'll remember that if there's a next time. Pipes sticking 12" out of the ground would have been ~2' too short to hit the oilpan on my vandal's truck, however. Next time I think I'd build something that'd just swing the mailboxes out of the way on impact.

:buddies:

Seems to me you could just put something nasty into the mailbox. Surely it would get smeared all over the vehicle?
Greg

GregWormald said:

Seems to me you could just put something nasty into the mailbox. Surely it would get smeared all over the vehicle?
Greg

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Might end up with a disgruntled mailman though.


I like the idea of the 12" pipes, but how about making them different heights, starting at about 6" and working up to 16" or so. That way whatever vehicle the guy is driving would ride up on the pipes and get stuck there.

Diesel_Bomber,
I would have loved to see the look on the kid's face when your mailbox took out his truck. In fact I probably would have paid to see it.

Baseball bat attacks around here are usually met by something along the lines of rebar in the posts and a brick or two in the mailbox. Also there is the possibility of waiting deputies or even worse, ticked off homeowners. The kids around here that do this stuff are neither too creative nor attentive. They fail to realize that several of the farmers in the area did this same stuff when they were kids, so they know how to deal with it. They also don't even think to look a little further down the road to see who's waiting for them. You can't outrun a police radio or a telephone.

LedSled said:

Quite a few years ago, one of our family friends found a kinder, gentler, way to deal with a similar problem. In line with his mailbox, he sank a row of 3" OD heavy wall galvanized steel pipes into concrete footings, leaving about 12" of pipe above ground level. When his neighborhood's young vandal showed up for another round of mischief, he ended up ripping the oil pan off of his car's engine, but nothing else was damaged and nobody was hurt. Naturally, young Einstein floored it trying to get away, and of course he didn't get far. The cops found his car abandoned by the side of the road with a siezed engine. Another father was less than pleased with his son's antics, but our friend just got smiles from the county deputies. As far as I know, his pipes are still there.
:lolsign:

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I should have also mentioned that he stretched a link chain between the pipes and painted the whole assembly black, turning it into kind of a low-slung boundary fence. His neighbors found it quite attractive!

powernoodle said:

Your brain is functioning on a higher plane along side the Great Thinkers of humanity - Aristotle, Da Vinci, Einstein, Paul Rubens (Peewee Herman, not the 16th Century Flemish painter), and Powernoodle. You are a true Flashaholic.

Well done.

cheers

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<elvis>Thank you. Thank you very much!</elvis>

It seems to me there are several ways of going about the problem:
1. Brute force defense. We've seen several examples of this. My concern with going this route is the possibility of actually seriously hurting someone. As much as this pisses me off, I don't think I'd really want to hurt someone over a 5 dollar mailbox. As someone mentioned, there may also be laws and ordinances to deal with This approach would work against the baseball bat and drive over attack, but not against the explosive attack.

2. Passive defense, such as buying one of those "punching bag" plastic mailboxes that gives and then pops back. One of our neighbors actually has a removeable mailbox - they take it in when they pick up the mail in the evening and put it back out when they go to work in the morning. This works well as long as the mailboxes aren't attacked during the day. I may try this one out since we don't seem to get the "drive over" attackers around here.

3. High tech. Video camera attached to motion sensor. Comes on for a couple of minutes with every movement. Captures the crime on "tape" to be used as evidence in felony prosecution (I'm pretty sure messing with the mail is a felony). This is what I really want to do - put something on their permanent record!

good stories

its this kind of talk that makes me happy to have a 500 lumen light.

Chucula said:

good stories

its this kind of talk that makes me happy to have a 500 lumen light.

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....and an accurate rifle

dragoman

KDOG3 said:

I wish someone would put a mailbox made of concrete out when these idiots run around doing this. I'd love to see those punks' faces when they take a swing at that!

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Living in a rural area (nearest neighbor 2 miles) I have had quite a bit of trouble with the old mail box. Everything from shotguns to bats. About 8 years ago now I bought 2 boxes, one smaller than the other. I placed the smaller inside the larger and filled the gap with quick crete. For the pole I took 6" pvc pipe, hammered it into the ground 2ft, and filled it with more quickcrete. In 8 years I have not had to buy a new mailbox, it has a few marks on it from failed attempts, but I like that.:devil:

smknman said:

In 8 years I have not had to buy a new mailbox, it has a few marks on it from failed attempts, but I like that.:devil:

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Pics!

smknman said:

Living in a rural area (nearest neighbor 2 miles) I have had quite a bit of trouble with the old mail box. Everything from shotguns to bats. About 8 years ago now I bought 2 boxes, one smaller than the other. I placed the smaller inside the larger and filled the gap with quick crete. For the pole I took 6" pvc pipe, hammered it into the ground 2ft, and filled it with more quickcrete. In 8 years I have not had to buy a new mailbox, it has a few marks on it from failed attempts, but I like that.:devil:

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Brilliant!

I've only had two mailboxes get destroyed myself; one was actually the mailman getting his truck too close and crashing into it and the other was probably a baseball bat wielding person.

There was another mailbox in the neighborhood that was burned up by some kids with fireworks. The owner of that house, however, tried to blame it on me. Even then, every one who saw me asked if I had ever blown up a mailbox.

smknman, I've heard of the two mailboxes within each other with concrete between the two but never heard of anyone trying it. Be careful though, especially for the guys who like to lean out the window of a moveing vehicle with a bat hitting passing mailboxes, hitting that could break an arm or knock out the person.

yuandrew said:

Be careful though, especially for the guys who like to lean out the window of a moveing vehicle with a bat hitting passing mailboxes, hitting that could break an arm or knock out the person.

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How is that a problem? If they're going to be stupid, they'd better be tough.

JM-99

Very cool.

I recently saw a mailbox at a h ome improvement store - looked like it was made from 1/8" steel plate. I wonder how that would hold up.

Reactive armor anyone?