[Vwdiesel] 1989 Diesel Jetta door alarm mystery

[Dave Cook]

It is raining, which keeps getting the fireworks' wicks wet, so I am catching up on old emails instead...

Anyway, my Cabriolet functioned just like you mention.  The chime thought the key was always in the ignition.

I sprayed some lube in the lock switch and jiggled the key around a few times over several days, and eventually it started working fine.  Even turned out that the radio was wired to come on with the key in the switch like I had planned to do.  (Hook up the radio's "ON" signal wire to the chime wire for this signal.  Radio is activated when key is in, and turns off when the key is pulled.)

I still pulled the relay since I find the chime annoying.

Now I look forward to reading three more week's worth of emails to see if you solved the problem! :)

Dave Cook


--- On Sat, 6/12/10, Doyt W. Echelberger <doyt at buckeye-express.com> wrote:

> From: Doyt W. Echelberger <doyt at buckeye-express.com>
> Subject: [Vwdiesel] 1989 Diesel Jetta door alarm mystery
> To: vwdiesel at audifans.com
> Date: Saturday, June 12, 2010, 1:16 PM
> Yes Eric, that sounds like good
> engineering and the way things should work. 
> And thanks to the list for your replies.
> I'm gonna change the subject line, in the unlikely case
> that anyone will 
> ever have a similar problem with their door alarm
> 
> Eric mentioned the ignition switch as a possible cause of
> the unusual alarm 
> function....the PO told me the car has a new ignition
> switch, because he 
> had to jiggle the key sometimes to get it to connect and
> start. And with a 
> new ignition switch, the really loud door alarm sounds
> whenever I open the 
> door, even if the key is in my pocket. So, Initially I just
> pulled the 
> relay and stopped the sound.
> 
> After reading the replies of listees, I'm beginning to
> think that pulling 
> the relay may be just covering up another problem. Makes me
> suspicious of a 
> faulty wiring circuit somewhere. This car was custom-wired
> to connect like 
> a trailer to a motor home, so that the functions of the
> motor home tail 
> lights would be duplicated by the Jetta's tail lights.
> 
> And on top of that, the Jetta has a small trailer hitch and
> the tail lights 
> are wired to allow the Jetta to serve as a towing vehicle
> and send its tail 
> light signals to the little trailer behind it.
> 
> I'm beginning to realize that this whole nightmarishly
> complex system will 
> have to be superimposed on a factory wiring diagram in
> order to get an 
> intellectual handle on the peculiar functioning of the
> driver door alarm. 
> And then it would take an astute electrical engineering
> background to spot 
> any flaw in the design.
> 
> I'm thinking it might be more practical to just physically
> follow the wires 
> that are at the front of the car, which were there to
> connect it with the 
> motor home. Then I'll interrupt the point where they
> connect with the Jetta 
> electrical system, and effectively take them out of the
> equation. If the 
> behavior of the door alarm changes, I'll know that the
> motor home 
> connection was at fault. I'm not going to tow it behind my
> motor home, 
> because my motor home is a 1976 VW Campmobile.
> 
> If the door alarm function stays the same, after taking out
> the motor home 
> circuit, I'll trace the  wiring of the trailer-pig
> tail and disconnect it 
> also. And if that doesn't affect the door alarm, I'll open
> a cold one and 
> fugidaboudit all for a while.
> 
> And.... the PO is probably busy rewiring his new Focus the
> same way. Oh well.
> 
> Doyt
> 
> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
> At 10:39 PM 6/11/2010, you wrote:
> >But shouldn't it only be beeping if the door is open
> and the keys are
> >still in the ignition? That's the way my A1 is, anyway.
> It's hard to
> >tell from what Doyt said what exactly is going on. If
> it's constantly
> >beeping then try jiggling around the switch, sometimes
> the little
> >lever thing that lets it know that a key is in can get
> stuck in the up
> >position.
> >
> >Erik
> 
> 
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