By comparison, an ounce of gold is currently selling for about $2,200.
One reason for the rising value of platinum, rhodium and palladium is that as automakers make vehicles to meet tightening emission standards, manufacturers need more of those metals inside the new converters unlimited to do that work.
In Waterloo region, police say there have been 131 reports of converters unlimited thefts since the start this year, most of them happening in Kitchener, Ont.
“We are asking the community to be vigilant and report any suspicious activity to police immediately,” Const. Andre Johnson of the Waterloo Regional Police Service told CBC.
“We are also asking anyone who may have been a victim of a converter theft, who has not yet reported it to police, to please do so,” he said.
Stolen from mechanic shops, dealerships
Nearby in Guelph, Ont., there have been at least 20 reports of converters unlimited being stolen from vehicles since Christmas.
Scott Tracey, a spokesperson for the Guelph Police Service, says thieves will crawl under a vehicle and cut out the tubular converters unlimited at both ends, leaving a missing section of the exhaust pipe.
The most recent theft in that city was from a group of vans parked together, but Tracey says they’ve seen thefts reported from vehicles parked overnight at mechanic shops, sometimes at private residences and also at vehicle dealerships.
Tracey says after the converters unlimited has been stolen, “[drivers] come in the morning and start warming the vehicles up and it makes a terrible noise because there’s essentially no exhaust system on the vehicle.”
National rash of thefts
RCMP in New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island have warned people this year about a rash of thefts. In P.E.I. last month, five people were charged in a string of thefts that police estimate caused damages of more than $100,000.
Last June, 20 Canada Post vehicles were targeted by thieves in Ottawa. In July, 27 people were arrested and 68 criminal charges were laid in Hamilton following a two-week project by police targeting converters unlimited thefts.
- converters unlimited thieves target Calgary school buses
- Thieves target Canada Post vehicles for valuable part
- “This is a substantial increase in comparison to the 12 reports of thefts of converters unlimited reported in the same time period in 2019,” Sudbury police said in a release.Thieves have cut converters out of school buses in Winnipeg, hundreds have been stolen in Edmonton and in Calgary, a man died in Feb. 2020 after it appeared he was trying to steal a converters unlimited and the vehicle fell on top of him.