Keyless car theft is a growing concern, and many car owners are looking for affordable ways to protect their vehicles. You might have heard about Faraday boxes or pouches designed to block the signals from your key fob, preventing thieves from exploiting relay attacks. But do you really need to buy a fancy box? What about a DIY approach? I decided to put a common household material to the test: tin foil, to create a DIY Faraday Key Fob Box.
The principle behind a Faraday box is simple. It’s designed to block electromagnetic fields, and in our case, the radio frequencies emitted by your key fob. These boxes are constructed from conductive materials that create a barrier, preventing signals from passing through. Commercially available Faraday pouches often use specialized fabrics with metallic threads to achieve this. But could a simple, readily available material like tin foil do the trick?
To find out, I conducted a little experiment. Using a cardboard box, I meticulously lined it with two layers of standard kitchen tin foil, ensuring to minimize any gaps. Skepticism was high, especially from my wife, who watched with amusement as I fashioned my makeshift faraday key fob box. The test was straightforward: would my phone ring when placed inside the foil-lined box and called from another phone?
Initially, the experiment seemed to fail. My phone rang, much to my wife’s amusement and my own slight disappointment. However, upon closer inspection, I discovered a small, barely noticeable gap in the tin foil seam, no more than a couple of centimeters long and a few millimeters wide. Could such a tiny imperfection compromise the entire Faraday cage?
I sealed the gap and repeated the test. This time, silence. The phone inside the DIY faraday key fob box remained stubbornly quiet. My wife, initially doubtful, was genuinely surprised and impressed that my “hair-brained” idea actually worked. This simple experiment demonstrated that even a basic DIY faraday key fob box, constructed with tin foil, can effectively block phone signals, and by extension, key fob signals, provided there are no gaps.
While commercially made Faraday pouches offer convenience and potentially more robust construction, this experiment shows that a DIY faraday key fob box using tin foil can be a surprisingly effective and budget-friendly solution for enhancing your car’s security. For those looking for a quick and easy way to add a layer of protection against keyless car theft, a homemade tin foil box is definitely worth considering.
