Hello dear friends,
I'm the owner of a 1.1i 1996 Saxo, that had immobiliser issues for the last 20 years, and the left window motor stopped working recently (see my username).
The car has been bought new by my family way back when, and since then it's changed hands many times, all within the family, so we all have our experiences with it. Getting the immobiliser to work has become somewhat of a dark art, shrouded in mystery and finessing the key and whatnot, just trying a few times, but yesterday just would not work, at all. All family members tried to turn it on, which means its gone off the deep end.
After reading many threads on this forum (thank god it exists) i learned more about these units and how the key code is read magnetically by the ring around the lock. So i just took my spare key, pressed it right against the thing, and then turned over the lock with the other key and voila! Neat. So most likely the immo works fine, key works fine, just the pickup coil has been neurotic all this time, mystery solved i guess.
However i'd like to stop this from happening again, so i also read threads on disabling the immobiliser permanently. AFAIK, just turn on the engine, disconnect the immo black box while its running and you're done. I haven't seen the principle of how this works explained anywhere (guess people just wanna be done with the whole thing), but if i had to guess the immo re-locks the ECU only while turning off the engine, so if you disconnect it, it cant send the signal back to the ECU to lock it, so it just stays permanently unlocked.
However two things i havent seen ever answered in very clear terms and that is:
1. If i ever plug the immo box back in, the ECU becomes locked again. Everyone then keeps talking "oh you have to take it to a dealer to unlock it", but isn't it just back to its original state, able to be unlocked with a key, i.e exactly the way i have it right now, no dealer needed as long as i have the key, working as right from the factory.
Because i've never seen anyone ever say "well you could turn it on like a normal person *or* if you dont have the key have the ecu unlocked professionaly as a last resort.
I understand this is probably because this forum is for swapping engines, so a mishmash of parts has to happen and no original keys in sight? I just want to know this for 100%, because if plugging it back in somehow permanently disables the ECU until looked at by a dealer as everyone dramatically makes it out to be, then this saxo is probably just going straight to the wreckers the moment im not able to turn it on again. Also info that comes in handy for the next guy down the line (and God knows there are many) that searches these threads that has issues with his immo.
2. Where is the box? Seriously, the only thread that has any pictures is
this one and i think they speak for themselves. Some describe the general location of it, but i cant see it. Hard enough to get your head under the passenger dash as it is, think i'll crack a vertebrae contorting for 30mins to find anything. That being said, to continue the tradition here's my shitty pic of the underside of the dash
If i have to guess, its somewhere in the upper left part of that photo. The thing with the brown plug is probably the ventilation (btw surprise, also doesn't work anymore!). Is it even in the photo, or do i need to remove parts of the dash or carpet to dig it out?
Any help would be mucho appreciando! Cheers
