How does one turn off the engine after hotwiring a car?

i think it depends on how it was hotwired.
pulling the wires apart would probably do it.

well. If I were hot wiring cars to steal them I may as well take it one step further and syphon the gas. At least that’s how I’d turn it off.

Well I’m pretty sure that when you hotwire it you only touch the ignition wires together for a moment (just like when you turn the key as far forward as it goes to get the car running), and then leaves the wires apart because if you kept them touching the car would just keep ‘starting up’. Obviously if it’s a manual the easiest way to stop it would be to stall it when parking or whatever. As for an automatic, I’m not too sure…

You could disconnect the battery. That usually shuts them off.

I used to have an old muscle car with a broken ignition. It was my only mode of transportation and I was a poor college student so I bypassed the ignition.

To untwist the wires will kill the engine- however simple hot wiring works mainly in older vehicles.

To hot wire a vehicle used to mean you would bypass the ignition switch and allow the completed circuit to power to the starter. Once the connection is broken from the twisted wires the engine shuts off.

Modern cars are not as easily hot wired due to digital and computerized components.
Not saying it cannot be done of course- there are ways but it is a more complex now.

Pliers and access to the fuel line is how I would do it.

I would attempt to stall it, if it’s manual, all the easier, if it’s automatic, go down a road and stick it into reverse and less than a second later there you go, you have an engine that safety stalled itself before ruining the transmission.

.. done it before, It scared the sh*t out of me…

This is a very interesting question. I dated a car theif in the 70’s, but I don’t know how he did it. (Note to self: Don’t park near anyone posting in this thread, ha ha!!)

@XCNuse, I know guys who did that kind of thing in rental cars for the fun of it (slamming into Park whilst moving forward). At higher speeds, the tranny just makes a lot of clicking racket. Eventually the car coasts and slows down enough that the safeguards think it’s okay to engage Park for real… stopping your forward motion rather abruptly.

Cannot recall if it stalled the car, though.

… well putting it in park is horrible for the tranny, putting it in reverse will stall the car if you don’t touch the gas pedal.

Putting it in park just locks the gears up, and if it survives damages all sorts of things anyway or hurts them, if it doesn’t live, then you congrats you destroyed a transmission.

It stalls the car, I mean the electronics will still be running, but the engine is fully stalled and isn’t running.

Brand new cars might have things to stop that from happening in the first place though, but it worked in my ‘95 GMC Jimmy

Older ignitions have two circuits that need to be closed in order for the engine to run. One is the “Run/Neutral safety” circuit, and the other is the starter relay. The “run” circuit must be closed (twisted together) at all times while the engine is running. The “Starter Relay” circuit is the wires that you contact temporarily in order to start the car. If you want to turn the car off, open (untwist) the “run” circuit.
This info comes in handy when you’re building a dune buggy with a push-button ignition.
or don’t have the scratch for a taxi…did I just say that?

I never new that, thanks for the tip Knotmyday!