chancecasey

OK here's a weird one. Of course, it happened to my wife. Anyway, she locked the car and left it parked in the rain last night. They went somewhere in another car and when she got back the fog lights were on and the alarm was sounding. She tried unlocking the car (which usually stops the alarm), started the car, killed the car - did this a few times but didn't help so they disconnected the battery.

I disconnected the alarm horn and car works fine, locks and unlocks ok (alarm seems to arm and disarm according to the single blinks of the led, but the fog lights are now permanently on. WTF?

jimq

water got in something from the sounds of it. See if the rear floor is wet and look under the seats

chancecasey

Will do. Also, the alarm doesn't seem to be "alarming" - the alarm horn and fogs are constantly on when I connect the battery, not going off and on like when you trip the alarm. The heavy rain points to a short somewhere, just not sure where. The fuse box and alarm box area look totally dry. I'll check the floorboards now...

...Just checked the floorboards all dry except the front passenger was pretty damp - there's just a huge wiring harness there, though, no connections.

I also have both the fog relay and fuse out and they still stay on. The reverse light is not on.

Another weird thing is that I only very recently starting even using the fog lights. I probably left them on when I killed the car the other day - for the very first time. Maybe the very next time or two the car was run and then stopped this happened. Maybe a coincidence.

C4Russ

How is the battery itself? These cars are particulary sensitive to batteries in poor condition. They alarm, run funny and are generally a PITA when the battery is not at full health.

chancecasey

almost brand new battery - shows good voltage when off and idling - one thing I've done so far - I notice the alarm horn wires are brown and red with white tracer - and i noticed one of the 2 fat connectors up in there have those same wires (maybe going to the fog lights?), so i disconnected that connector and now my fogs are off - headlights still work. Next is to reconnect the alarm horn and see if it is now off or still on. By the way, is there something behind the fog lights to get them off? Took off everything else, including bumperette, but that fog doesn't budge.

chancecasey

ok when i hook up the alarm horn (with the fog light connector i mentioned that has the horn wires in it disconnected) it blows. So, since I can't reset or turn off the alarm, and it seems to "arm/disarm" normally when locking/unlocking the doors, it would seem I have a short somewhere in the circuit which lights up the alarm horn and fogs - and the fog relay and fuse are both out.

One correction, that connector only has a brown wire in common with the alarm horn, not the red/white tracer.

Like I said, from peering in with a flashlight, the alarm box and fuse box are look bone dry. Oh boy.

How exactly do I get the alarm unit out? Maybe it has some moisture on the inside.

chancecasey

Dammit, wish I would have tried this before ripping so much crap apart.

Alarm control box was wetter than heck. Guess that body seal right above it between fender and body part behind hood was leaking. Blowdried it all out, works great. Now I'm just going to ziploc the box and zip tie it, then put some vaseline all in that seal space and pop the seal back in.

Tezme

Remove alarm box again and clean circuit board with proper pcb cleaner or similar to be 100% that ALL corrosion is gone. I don't trust the hair dryer trick and if cleaned properly you know for certain all water is gone. The water can and does sit under the chips and start corroding up between the ic legs real quick causing your problems all ove again. Be quick before it's to late, it will be doing it's damage right now if water is still present on circuit board.

WARNING: You have checked the Motronic box aswell for water haven't you???

If you haven't than disconnect the battery IMMEDIATELY and pull out and clean down the Motronic box IMMEDIATELY aswell.