Power Door Lock & Trunk Problems

[wendyl]

Hi! I am brand-new to this site & have enjoyed all the topics & helpful answers I’ve read. I have a ’97 ES300 w/ 155,000 miles on it. We bought it from my mother-in-law who used it for real estate purposes in Seattle, so much of its first 100,000 miles were highway miles. It has been well-maintained thru-out its years & has had all the recommended service procedures.

I’ve got a real stumper that’s a bit of a combination of some topics I’ve read on this site. Forgive me if I missed the answer. I would appreciate any help!

Around 120,000 miles, we noticed both remotes intermittently failing to unlock the doors, the trunk, then they failed to lock the vehicle, etc. We experienced the same as others who have described various degrees of success – they may work depending on the distance away from the car, the angle, etc. We replaced batteries in both remotes which did not seem to affect their performance.

Around 10,000 miles ago, the remotes stopped working entirely. Shortly thereafter, the interior door switches stopped LOCKING the doors. Both driver’s side & passenger side door switches will UNLOCK all doors, but neither will lock the doors. The interior buttons for the trunk do not work either (driver’s side & glove box). I can unlock and lock all the doors manually & use the key to unlock the trunk.

Today I replaced the battery in the remote I have with me, & took care to make sure the circuit board was seated within the remote in order to make contact with the push buttons. I then tuned my FM radio to 94.9 & hit all the buttons on the remote, including the panic button, but heard nothing on the radio besides static (however I don’t know what is supposed to happen there). I checked the turn-knob under the steering wheel to ensure the remote feature was “on” … that’s what I gathered I should do from reading other posts here. When it’s turned fully one way, I can hear the beep when I press the “unlock” button on the remote; when it’s turned fully the other way, I don’t hear any beep but I do hear the door lock signal being sent – but nothing happens.

So the progress is: I know the remote is talking to the car because I can hear something working. However, the remote does not do any action on the doors - except it WILL unlock the trunk! So that’s an improvement. The other weird thing is, the only time a signal seems to be sent is if the driver’s side door is open & unlocked. If that door is open & locked or closed & I depress the unlock button on the remote, nothing at all happens – I can’t hear anything trying to happen.

Sorry for the lengthy explanation but I have taken it to three garages here, including the lone Lexus dealership, and no one seems to have a clue what to do. But they all would like to charge me a day’s worth of labor to just have a “look-see” …

Thanks for any assistance you can give me!

Wendy

[blk_on_blk]

You might want to contact a priest for an exorcism :o ...for you've got something strange going on with your vehicle. Seriously though, my guess is that's it's purely electrical. You may have some corrosion or resistance build up somewhere, or something is damaged in the electronics of this system. My gut tells me, by your sporadic symptoms, that it's corrosion or resistance build up somewhere. Maybe someone spilled a soda pop or juice in an area that's causing strange semi-conducting shorting (I've seen stranger things), or it could be a component that isn't totally burning out, but rather just spent enough to act sporadically.

The lock-unlock actuators are just solenoids that kick out to move the mechanism one way or another. if there isn't enough power to them to generate the magnetic field to make them move, they'll just sit there. They also have mechanical spring returns, so there has to be enough energy going to the solenoid to overcome the return spring before it can even push to unlock/lock the door. If there's not enough power to the actuator (and that sounds like what is happening), then the system isn't going to move mechanically.

So, for solutions... hopefully someone on here will have experienced a similar thing and will know what the remedy is through the agony they went through to find the solution. OR, you can search in your area for a automotive technician who is a guru at the electricals of vehicles. Some of these guys are amazing how they can try down and pinpoint the root cause... the hardest part is finding these guys. Check Citysearch for shop recommendations, or search through other methods. I know an amazing shop here in Portland, but that's a little far from you :) I wish you the best of luck, for these intermitant problems are the hardest to diagnose and pinpoint.

Oh, and that turn knob under the dash is silly... it's only to control the volume of the 'beep' when you arm-disarm the vehicle. You can barely hear it when it's on, and who wants it off when the parking lights don't even flash. You'd have to really look closely to ensure the vehicle locked/armed when you pressed the button on the FOB.

[kashi125]

I had the same problem with my 97 ES300. The remote would work intermittently. I did not have any problem locking or unlocking the doors using the interior door switches though....

Unfortunately, I did not find any solution to my remote problem. It would work 1 out of 10 times when pressed. I did notice that pressing the unlock button along one corner of the remote made it work better than pressing the entire button. So my conclusion was that over time the switches inside the remote get corroded etc. I was ready to buy a new one on eBay--but then I sold my car and got an 02 ES <_<

Couple of things that I thought I should let you know:

1) About FM radio at 94.9: You have to do this in another car or a radio at home because the remote operation is disabled when you put in the key and turn it to ACC (for radio operation) in your own car.

2) About: "turn-knob under the steering wheel to ensure the remote feature was on"--That knob is only for the 'beep' volume control. It does not turn on or off the remote operation.