Raleigh car shop partners with police, AAA to raise awareness on catalytic converter thefts

A Raleigh car repair shop teamed up with the Raleigh Police Department and AAA hosted an event on Saturday to make it harder to steal catalytic converters.

A catalytic converter is a control device for exhaust emissions in cars. The converters contain valuable metals like platinum and palladium.

Scott Stillwell, director of Car Care Maintenance & Repair, said it can take “minutes” for someone to steal them from your car.

“It’s simple,” he said. “Someone can slide under a vehicle or jack up the vehicle, take some tools, and have some of these converters off within three or five minutes.”

In recent years, authorities have reported an increase in thefts.

According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, drivers in the United States experienced more than 64,000 catalytic converter thefts just in 2022.

“It seems to be a hot topic all over the United States,” the AAA Carolina area manager said. “We’ve paid to replace several of them that got stolen in parking lots around our stores.”

The converters are valuable on the black market due to the metals inside. Stillwell said while the converters are worth plenty, they’ll hit your wallet hard trying to replace them.

“Normally, you’re at least $1,000 to replace a converter. So, it can get very expensive,” he said.

In most cases, Stillwell added that car insurance providers do not cover replacing converters.

Car Care hosted a free event to help educate drivers about the crime and offer solutions to prevent it. Drivers who brought their cars in had the opportunity to get a serial number etched onto their catalytic converters.

“So we put a liquid on the converter. There is an acid liquid that we paste on there, and from there, as the converter heats up, it basically burns the sticker off, and we have the etching in there,” Stillwell said.

The etching is a serial number registered by police to help track the part if it ever lands in the wrong hands.

While the serial number won’t make it less likely for the part to get stolen, Stillwell said it will make it harder to sell.

“We just want to help and provide whatever deterrent we can to help our customers and [the] communities we serve,” he said.

Stillwell said other actions you can take are buying catalytic converter cages or a vibration-sensitive car alarm you can place underneath your vehicle.

Drivers can also park in well-lit areas or near building entrances.