I Lost A Key Fob...or did I???

I believe your fob is not in the car, or at least within detection range. (There are a few radio dead spots.) It thinks the fob battery is dead, and is asking you hold it up to the power switch to use its backup RFID method.

A test of my car, without the key, shows the KEY NOT DETECTED message first, then the DEPRESS BRAKE PEDAL, TOUCH POWER SWITCH WITH KEY message.

 

And the flashing red light is normal. Many owners never notice it. It's an indication the coded key system is working (theft prevention). It flashes continuously when the car is not on, door open or closed. "On" being "ready", "acc", or "ign on".

Now go find your missing FOB!

 

So this same thing just happened to me. Last night I had my keys in my hand and I distinctly remember unlocking the car with the button on the remote. Then I got in, turned the car on, and drove home. When I got to my house, I looked for my keys before I got out of the car (I usually toss them in the cup holder or in storage area under the console bridge thing) but I couldn't find them. At that point, I turned the car off and tried to turn it on again, and got the "KEY NOT DETECTED" message. So I'm thinking two things could have happened:

1. When I got into car and turned it on the first time, I accidentally dropped keys outside car before shutting the door. But I'm skeptical of this possibility because 1) I probably would have heard keys hitting the pavement, and 2) in my experience, when you remove the fob from the car any time it's powered on, you get the KEY NOT DETECTED message and flashing yellow triangle almost immediately. I did not get this message at all on the way home.

2. I somehow lost my key inside the car and it's in a location where the receiver can't detect its presence. I looked everywhere I usually drop things in the car, though, and I just don't see it.


Does anybody else have experience with this? Are there certain RFID dead spots in the car and it's possible that my key is in one of these locations? Does anybody know what these spots are?

 

I'm guessing the fob is in the car (or within range of the car) with a dead battery, based on the message.

 

Note also that you would have had to drop the fob outside after pressing the Power button to start the ignition. While the doors unlock with the fob outside, the ignition requires the fob to be within range of the inside antennas.

 

I'm sure there are dead spots in the car. Probably more likely where it's surrounded by metal, like under the seats.
Also, if I'm not mistaken, the car only checks for the presence of the key when the door is closed. If you, for example, roll down the window and chuck your key out the window, it won't yell at you for not having a key until you open and close a door.

I agree that you probably would have had to drop the fob outside the car after pressing the power button (and closing the door, as I noted), otherwise the car probably would have detected that the fob was outside, not inside.

Look around, it'll probably turn up. My wife's key finally showed up like 8 or 9 months after she lost it... At one point, I even carried all of her stuff past the locked driver's side door, hoping that the car would detect the key buried in a drawer or a hidden pocket or something, and light up the interior and unlock. I didn't find it then, but she did then find it elsewhere only a month or so after I tried this.

If I had been a only a little bit angrier about the lost key, I wouldn't have put all her stuff back in the house afterwards...