well they all suffer that fate with the old receiver, it just depends if the right RF signals are present. Often various household stuff uses the 433mhz frequency. For instance i have a wireless thermostat for the heating that uses it.

When i parked it directly in front of the house, it certainly drained the battery within a couple days, enough that i went and bought a solar panel to keep the battery topped up. However parking to the side of the house for several weeks without the solar panel attached seems to have no drain issues. But clearly refitting the antenna i'm sure will make it much worse

I'm still slightly wary about using the remote, because i dont want it superlocking itself and leaving me stranded. I've not quite managed to figure out what makes it superlock, so for now i've been locking with the key and unlocking with the remote. I will at some point disconnect the superlocking wires within the locks to ensure it cant do that!

It should only superlock if you press the button on the fob twice, one press locks it, two presses superlocks it. So if you have a bit of key bounce in the fob you could superlock it when you don't mean to. Same with locking with the key, turn it once to lock, twice to superlock. When you lock it the indicators flash once, when you superlock it, they flash 3 times and about 15 seconds after you lock it you hear the superlock motors do their thing. I know the earlier ones are worse for problems but I always superlock mine, it's just habit to press the fob button twice and it hasn't locked me out yet (although we did discover at last years Summer Camp that the superlock on my drivers door doesn't work). All 433 MHz devices are licence exempt as momentary operated devices so shouldn't transmit all the time but they must be the only devices known to man that when they fail they don't stop working they work continuously and that causes a problem. You'll also flatten the battery if something is momentary but transmitting very frequently. The Watchman units on heating oil tanks have a habit of transmitting every few seconds instead of every hour when the battery in them starts to go flat. Then your BeCM never gets chance to go to sleep and the car battery will go flat.

One thing we discovered this weekend with Smiler's early DSE was that if Immobilisation was turned off in the BeCM, which you would normally do to stop the engine being immobilised if you don't start it within 30 seconds of unlocking the door, it immobilises it permanently. Very early cars didn't have the mobilisation coil around the ignition switch so we suspect that if that isn't there they don't have the passive immobilisation enabled anyway and turning it off causes the whole thing to get very confused.

I just dont trust the electronics well enough. If something goes wrong with it superlocked, its break-a-window time and i dont want to end up in that situation. At least if its only locked, i can mechanically open it with the key etc. Its more likely to lock me out and cause me headaches, than it is to prevent someone breaking in.

Its good to know it wont superlock with one press though. i guess that means i can use the remote in the mean time.

Disable the superlocking motors by cutting one of the wires in each door. I've done this because I want the ultrasonic sensors inside activated when I lock the car - which only happens when its superlocked, but I don't want to risk getting a door stuck superlocked (again...).

The car doesn't know any better whether the superlocking motors work or not. I see it this way - if someone really wants something from inside the car, they're going to smash windows to gain access anyway.

+1 to chopping those superlock wires; You could, of course fit a switch so you can connect/disconnect superlock at will - but as Gilbertd explained in the normal situation you can still superlock with the key (only), however if the battery then flattens (for various reasons) you then have a major entry problem.

(At one point I had a not-very-easy-to-get-to-unless-you-knew-where-it was waterproof 12V connector to charge the battery up if it was completely flat,
-again for those usual reasons- but even then the BECM can get upset when the battery is recharged and maybe disable the engine..... Mine's a '95)

Easiest way to connect a charger if the battery has gone completely flat and you can't get into the car is by crawling under it and clipping onto the big positive terminal on the starter. Another good reason for making sure your EAS is in good nick so it stays where you left it and doesn't sink to the floor (unless you are even skinnier than me!).

In fact I fitted that connector after doing that crawl a couple of times Gilbertd...
Yes, with an iffy EAS and, being a P38, it was quite an oily/mucky crawl, too !!

Ok, so we said it'd return and it did...

This morning the missus went to get in, used the key in the drivers lock, only the drivers door unlocked. She didnt open the door, but locked and unlocked it a few times, same thing, so she called me.

I told her to try using the remote, holding it near the drivers rear window. She did that and it unlocked immediately.

Now, i cant actually remember if i locked it using the remote or the key last time i used it, would that make a difference? I'm sure i read something about if you lock with the remote you cant then open with the key, but i cant really remember. If it doesnt matter, then clearly it implies something iffy with the drivers door lock? I presume a bad microswitch or similar?

Yes, if it will unlock all doors with the fob but only the drivers door with the key, the key switch in the drivers door latch is faulty. You are physically unlocking the door by turning the key but if the switch isn't making contact it won't tell the BeCM to trigger the central locking and unlock the others.

If you lock with the key you can unlock with either the key or the fob, if you lock with the fob then you must unlock with it too or the door will open but the car will remain immobilised.

If you have locked it with the fob, but then unlocked it with the key, then it will ONLY open the drivers door until you've put the EKA code it.

As LR intended the vehicle to primarily be locked/unlocked with the remote fob, and the key in the door being the backup for that - I imagine that's why it does it. So if someone managed to get a copy of the key blade, they couldn't just walk up to it and drive off if you've locked it with the remote.

If you've locked it with the key, then it should unlock with the key and allow starting again (after it's been started/running etc)

Yeh i did wonder. We're still mostly using the key as the antenna is unplugged and the fob range is useless, but i had a feeling that when i came in the other day i had stuff in my hands and just hit the fob button to lock, so thats probably what its been.

Both my A4 and my E90 BMW do effectively the same thing. If you unlock with the key, only that door opens and the alarm goes off. Once you put the ignition on the alarm stops and the rest of the car unlocks. I guess the range rover pre-dates the integration which allows the alarm to realise that a valid key is present in the ignition, and hence have the awful EKA system instead!

Later ones had the coil around the ignition switch so will turn off the alarm as soon as the key is inserted by telling the fob to transmit. No good if the receiver isn't working, the signal is being blocked by something stronger or the antenna has been disconnected so the fob is too far away for the signal to be received though. EKA is actually a good system as it does allow you to start the car even if the fob or receiver aren't working for whatever reason but it still means that if someone has a key blade that will fit the locks they still can't steal the car. If the BMW system relies on the ignition being switched on, and not on an induction coil to detect the key, then any old key that can be jiggled in the locks will allow it to be started.

The Audi and BMW both have transponder chips in the key which are seperate to the alarm fob. The transponder is used to disarm the immobiliser and is checked on every start. The RF remote for unlocking is a seperate system and isnt not part of the immobilisation process.

I guess when the immobiliser system detects a valid key, it also signals the alarm/locking system to disarm and unlock. So if you jammed a copy key (or screwdriver) in it wouldnt disarm the alarm, and the engine wouldnt start either.

On the Audi the immobiliser is handled by the instrument cluster, whereas the locking and alarm is handled by a comfort unit in the boot. The BMW has a combined comfort/security module that handles both.

Sadly BMW screwed the pooch with vehicle security and ended up having a LOT of locked and alarmed vehicles being stolen by scrotes armed with an OBDII cable and a blank key fob :(

http://jalopnik.com/5923802/watch-hackers-steal-a-bmw-in-three-minutes

oh yeh, swathes of them are vulnerable.

I bought a accident damaged A4 (albeit an older 2000 model) a few years back, which came with one key, that was snapped in half and glued back together. I bought a new case and attempted to swap the internals and managed to break the transponder chip in half leaving me with an immobilised car.

Got a lead off ebay for about £30, and a new blank transponder, and coded up the new key in a few minutes.

I guess the issue is, security access needs to be possible with an immobilised car, otherwise the dealer cant program new keys when you turn up having lost them... And once the security protocols over OBD are cracked, then anyone can buy the lead and do the same. The immobiliser has a secret key code a bit like the EKA, which needs input into the software while programming the key. This code is dealer only and unlike landrover they wont even give it out to end users at all.

However for a lot of the cars, the ebay leads can actually extract the key code from the RAM of the cluster after an OBD connection has been made. The cluster has to load it into ram to compare it with the input version, and someones figured out how to dump the RAM of the microprocessor over OBD. Thus you simply connect, read out the SKC, and then program a key using the standard routines that a dealer would use.

I've emailed Marty to see if he is aware of this one and it may only apply to older cars, but I discovered something last night which I figured was worth adding to this thread. The BeCM in the Ascot says EKA disabled but I wasn't sure what effect this would have. The central locking currently doesn't work on the drivers door (so I've got to pull the latch and deal with that) but that means that I can lock it with the fob and the drivers door stays unlocked. Last night I'd locked it on the fob and then without thinking, opened the drivers door. The hazards started to flash showing that I'd triggered the alarm (sounder is unplugged) and my initial thought was, Oh sh*t, which one of the handwritten numbers on the paperwork is the EKA. Unlocked it with the fob and the hazards continued to flash. Put the key in the ignition, turned it on, dash said Alarm Triggered, RH Door, hazards stopped flashing but when I turned the key the engine started. No immobilisation, no press remote, no enter EKA, no nothing, it just worked and the engine started.

So, if EKA Disabled does remove the need for the EKA, it would seem to be the answer to an awful lot of grief suffered by numerous people.

Maybe unlock with fob disarmed it?

I'll have more of a play with it tomorrow and try various different combinations. I've got 3 different 4 digit numbers and two of those are allegedly the EKA (one in the service book and one written on the owners handbook) so with a bit of luck I'll be able to sort it with the Nano if it does all go tits up.

I haven't had a chance to look into how changing the various settings makes a difference to the user end of the security system...

I have heard that disabling the EKA will prevent the need for it being entered most of the time - however, if you can manage to get it into KEYCODE LOCKOUT showing on the dash, and the EKA is disabled, then you have no way of entering it, and the BECM would need to be sent off for resetting (That was something Rick from Callrova mentioned on another forum).

I haven't been able to test the theory, or test what differences there are between older/newer BECM models either - but most of the time turning off the passive immobiliser and the EKA seems to sort most of the headaches out... I keep the EKa enabled on mine as that's how it was from the factory, and b) I know the correct EKA, c) I can enter it with Nanocom - being a later model P38, and c) worst comes to worst... I know a guy with the equipment to reset it ;)

Tried it on the Ascot yesterday. Locked it on the fob but, as it isn't working, the drivers door didn't lock, opened the drivers door and the hazards started flashing to tell me the alarm had been set off. Put the key in the ignition, turned it on and it came up with Engine Immobilised, Press Remote and the engine wouldn't turn over. Pressed the remote and it then turned over and started. So no option to enter the EKA, just use the remote. Not so good if you don't have a working remote or the signal is being blocked.