What the Beep?
October 9, 2006 – 12:46 pm by Matt Radel
Filed under Rants, Volkswagen Golf
Need…my…alarm….
Usually, my Golf sounds like all ‘dubs do when I lock it with the remote - ya know, with a beep that rivals the censorship of the punchline to an Andrew Dice Clay joke played on network TV. It offers comfort by giving me audio confirmation that my water tight doors are closed to the public until I say otherwise.
So naturally it pisses me off when my Golf decides to stop arming the alarm, as it did the other day. It’s an omission of some kind, like “Yeah, I’m locked BUT I won’t yell and scream if someone really tries to break into me”. My reaction is to press the button on the remote feverishly, trying to hear that lovely beep. I can’t walk away from it without knowing the alarm is enabled. I checked the other controls on the remote - each one worked fine, including the lock button. But no alarm. After running several errands and having to leave the alarm disabled, I was getting pretty annoyed. I turned the car off and on, and checked everything I could think of. Everything about the car was fine. Just…no…alarm.
And of course I find the solution in a public parking lot, after creating a bit of a scene (raising the remote to the heavens, cursing the automotive gods and powers that be) I jammed the key into the lock on the door (because I had left the sunroof open, which lead to another stream of embarrassing curses) and turned the key violently to the right.
*BEEP!*
Oh. Heh. Guess I could have tried to set the alarm that way in the first place. After that, the alarm worked perfectly fine. So just a word of advice: if the alarm on your ‘dub decides to stop arming, just set it with the old key in the door trick. Don’t act like an idiot like yours truly.
What the Beep?
October 9, 2006 – 12:46 pm by Matt Radel
Hehe, so what was up with it? Just needed to reset it or something by doing it the manual way?
Another thing to do if your alarm won’t set: double-check your doors, hood, and trunk lid. I recently tried to lock my ‘05 Passat and its alarm wouldn’t set, even with my doors, windows, and sunroof closed. On a hunch, I went back to the trunk and pushed down firmly on the lid. It latched, and I got that reassuring “BEEP” when I pressed the “Lock” button on my remote. (It seems I inadvertently unlocked the trunk by hitting the wrong button. That’s easy enough to do if you’re not paying attention.)
My Passat gets me about 1/2 the time with the delayed beep. I click, walk a step or two, stop, THEN it beeps. Like “Haha! Made you look!”
Ugh…the delayed beep. Yeah, mine gets me with that every now and then too. Good call on the trunk there Bill - I haven’t had that issue yet, it it makes total sense.
Anyone know why my 2001 VW New Beetle’s horn would be beeping for no reason? I start the car, it beeps like someone’s broken in. I drop off a kid at one school, she opens the door while the car’s running (usually not a problem) and the horn starts honking. I take the other kids to their school, same thing. Now we’re all mortified, as it’s not cool to drive off from middle school with my horn honking. I come home, turn off the car, open my door, again the car honks. This is a new problem. Any ideas?
Wow. That’s really weird. It sounds like there might be an issue with your alarm system, as it’s sensitivity might be set a shade too high. For such an odd issue, the best thing I can suggest would be to visit your dealer. They’re gonna be the best ones to end this madness asap.
One stormy day, my Golf had alarm issues. It would go off about every half hour. After cleaning out the pine needles and tree dandruff from the door jambs, I haven’t had a problem with it since.