how do i quickly disable my explorer?

[winner]

having some family issues and long story short, someone who shouldn't have a set of keys to my 98 explorer does and i dont want to have to retrieve my car again. how can i quickly disable my ex? besides doing something like disconnecting the battery? something not as obvious. i know there used to be something you could do with the distributor but im not engine smart.

 

[BradR]

well our trucks dont have distributors, but something a long that route might be unplugging the coil pack. However if your family member is not car smart they might try to keep cranking the engine burning out your starter...

you could also unsnap the throttle cable from the body, then they would get it started but not be able to drive it very far.

you could install a kill switch where if the member did not know about it they wouldn't be able to do anything.

could take out the main fuse (but thats just as easy as taking off the battery cable)

or best yet, park it somewhere the family member doesnt know where it is!

 

[XLT99]

You could set up a fuel pump kill switch, and hide it somewhere in the truck. That way whoever has those keys can crank it all day and it wont start. The fuel pump's inertia switch is behind the passenger side kick panel, I havent done it personally but iv seen posts from others on the forum who have done it by tapping into the inertia switch's wiring and running it through a hidden switch.

 

[Blee1099]

You could do a bunch of things.. Like pull the relays under the hood, remove a few wires off the coil pack. Or since you have a 1998, if you have two keys, you can reprogram the pats system with your two keys so that the other keys are invalid.

 

[waskly]

just remove the inertia switch.

also you can get the keys reprogrammed that the key they have wont start the car.

so while it will unlock the vehicle, it will not start it.

 

[zukman]

install a battrey kill switch and mount it under the fender well

 

[winner]

Thanks for the help guys! i no longer have to park outside my desk window, and get nervous when i leave my desk to take a leak! i unattached the throttle cable, this should do wonders!