When the car is off you can still press the clutch down and get out of gear. Any way to prevent this so that I can park with my cab down and not worry about some ******* throwing it in neutral on a hill?

 

There is no other way.What you can do is turn the wheels toward the curb so that if it does happen the car will only roll into the curb.
Your best bet is to leave the windows up or the top up. other than that you are taking that chance.

 

the steering column is automatically locked when the key is withdrawn from the ignition lock. So if your front wheels are pointed toward the curb you should be ok.

 

if you park on a hill by a rules you have to turn your front wheels into carb side and engage handbrake.

 

Parking a 6spd - put on the parking break. If the incline is steep, you angle the tires so the car would roll INTO the curb, and set the shifter in either 1st or Rev depending on direction of incline, AND the parking brake.

With the top down, you cannot prevent someone from shifting into neutral and releasing your parking brake. However, the ignition lock will prevent the steering wheel from being turned and that should limit the roll to the point that the downhill curbside wheel contacts the curb.

 

Thanks for your input guys. It just occurred to me that you would have the same issue with an automatic transmission which can also be thrown in neutral if the car is off. Being that this is my first cab and stick, I never had to deal with this issue before so I automatically blamed it on the manual transmission. Turning the wheels is a good suggestion but I guess the best bet is to close the roof. I do have SmartTop so its not that big of a deal.

 

Turning the wheels, if the incline is step, isn't just a suggestion, its highly recommended.

If the parking brakes fail or the gear lever slips, it keeps the car from going downhill.