Curious dead battery / car alarm problem.

[[email protected]]

So yesterday I left my car lights on for the whole day. When I got back
to the car, the battery was dead.

I managed to jump the car with cables of a colleague and thought I
would be fine.

However, now it happens that everytime I open the door some kind of car
alarm would start for about 20 seconds.

The thing is, I don't have a car alarm! Well, I was never told I had
one, and I don't have any electronic device to turn it off.

Do you have any idea on what I should do?

Thanks,
Carlo

[[email protected]]

BTW, I have a 2004 Chevrolet Aveo I bought from CarMax in December 2005.

[MOSFET]

The first thing I would try is to fully charge your battery. Perhaps you
can take a long drive (about an hour or so), that should do it. It's
possible the low-voltage is messing up your auto-security system. If this
doesn't work, check the voltage of your battery. Sometimes when a
conventional lead/acid battery is completely drained, it will never again
hold a full charge and will need to be replaced.

Hopefully your problem is just due to low voltage.

MOSFET

> wrote in message
oups.com...
> So yesterday I left my car lights on for the whole day. When I got back
> to the car, the battery was dead.
>
> I managed to jump the car with cables of a colleague and thought I
> would be fine.
>
> However, now it happens that everytime I open the door some kind of car
> alarm would start for about 20 seconds.
>
> The thing is, I don't have a car alarm! Well, I was never told I had
> one, and I don't have any electronic device to turn it off.
>
> Do you have any idea on what I should do?
>
> Thanks,
> Carlo
>

[e-nigma]

> wrote in message
oups.com...
> So yesterday I left my car lights on for the whole day. When I got back
> to the car, the battery was dead.
>
> I managed to jump the car with cables of a colleague and thought I
> would be fine.
>
> However, now it happens that everytime I open the door some kind of car
> alarm would start for about 20 seconds.
>
> The thing is, I don't have a car alarm! Well, I was never told I had
> one, and I don't have any electronic device to turn it off.
>
> Do you have any idea on what I should do?
>
> Thanks,
> Carlo
>

There may have been an alarm installed by previous owner and did not give
them the remotes or they were lost.
The best thing would be to take it to a installation shop and have the alarm
removed

[[email protected]]

Thanks for your reply.

I have an appointment this friday with a specialist and they will
remove completely the alarm for $75.

That seems a bit expensive to me... do you think I have any
alternative? Is there a point for me in going back to CarMax and ask
them for help?

Thanks,
Carlo

[Brandonb]

I guess a question is.. what kind of sound does it make? Is it just a
honking horn? or does it sound like an actual after-market alarm? Its
possible the Aveo has something built-in, but would probably only be a
honking horn. If so, I would look at MOSFET's advice. If sounds like an
aftermarket, probably continue with the specialist. You'd think they'd
be able to at least give an opinion without charging if its something
that needs removed or not. You can try CarMax, but that's a crapshoot.

Brandonb


wrote:
> Thanks for your reply.
>
> I have an appointment this friday with a specialist and they will
> remove completely the alarm for $75.
>
> That seems a bit expensive to me... do you think I have any
> alternative? Is there a point for me in going back to CarMax and ask
> them for help?
>
> Thanks,
> Carlo
>

[Captain Howdy]

Is it that bad of an idea to have a car alarm now days? This alarm might have
a few options that might be useful to you, such as remote door locks and
remote start. It might be cheaper to have the specialist identify the make and
model of the alarm and finding replacement remotes for the unit. Ebay is full
of cheap replacement remotes.

In article . com>,
wrote:
>Thanks for your reply.
>
>I have an appointment this friday with a specialist and they will
>remove completely the alarm for $75.
>
>That seems a bit expensive to me... do you think I have any
>alternative? Is there a point for me in going back to CarMax and ask
>them for help?
>
>Thanks,
>Carlo
>

[e-nigma]

$75 seems high to remove alarm, but it may be high estimate because they do
not know what's in it. If it
has a full blown alarm, with remote start and other options, then $75 is a
fair price. But if it is just a basic
alarm, then that is high, because it should only take about 10-20 minuets to
remove

> wrote in message
oups.com...
> Thanks for your reply.
>
> I have an appointment this friday with a specialist and they will
> remove completely the alarm for $75.
>
> That seems a bit expensive to me... do you think I have any
> alternative? Is there a point for me in going back to CarMax and ask
> them for help?
>
> Thanks,
> Carlo
>

[[email protected]]

I actually tried the crapshoot of going to CarMax and -guess what?-
they unhooked it for free in 10 minutes.

WAY TO GO CARMAX!!!

Thanks for your help, everybody!

Carlo

[[email protected]]

Oh, and it was a very stupid basic alarm. That's why I am not worried
that the car will stop working... I am really confident it was just a
sound alarm.

I was not interested in keeping it, also I plan on selling the car to
CarMax again in a couple of months.

Ciao,
Carlo