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Alarm going off in the night

Discussion in 'Prime Main Forum (2017-2022)' started by Richard Sherwood, Aug 2, 2019.

  1. Richard Sherwood

    Richard Sherwood New Member

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    Hi I have a 2017 Prius Plugin and for the past couple of nights the alarm has gone on for no apparent reason. Has this happened to anyone else? Have checked the vehicle over and I can't see any evidence of why it would have gone off. Reading online, I can see some vehicles have had this problem due to faulty bonnet/hood sensors. Any advice or tips greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
     
  2. Curlyone

    Curlyone Member

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    Think first thing I would do is rule out something/someone messing with the car. Even in a closed garage it's possible a pet/child/racoon/etc could be doing it. I'd setup a webcam set to record on movement.
    I recommend a Wyze cam. Cheap, good quality, but it requires being plugged in for power.
    If no power is available I've used the Blink cameras. While more expensive than Wyze it operates on 2 AA batteries which means it can be stuck up almost anywhere.

    If you can prove (thru video) it's not some outside influence that *might* be enough to get the dealer to investigate and fix?
     
  3. Trollbait

    Trollbait It's a D&D thing

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    I also suggest sticking the fobs in a metal container or foil to eliminate a stray panic signal as a cause.
     
  4. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    welcome!
    any aftermarket devices, especially the alarm?
     
  5. Richard Sherwood

    Richard Sherwood New Member

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    Thanks for the suggestion. I’ve ruled out foul play and animal interference using my nest cam.

    Think I’ll have to take it to the dealer to take a look
     
  6. huskers

    huskers Senior Member

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    Wait, Primes have a alarm?
     
  7. Trollbait

    Trollbait It's a D&D thing

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    If the fob has a panic button, there is probably an alarm.
     
  8. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    usually the horn
     
  9. MikeDee

    MikeDee Senior Member

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    Deleted.
     
  10. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    expletive.
     
  11. mistermojorizin

    mistermojorizin Active Member

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    Maybe in the UK? I don't think US primes have alarms.
     
  12. MikeDee

    MikeDee Senior Member

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    Mine does.
     
  13. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    is the steering wheel right?:cool:
     
  14. Tom B

    Tom B Junior Member

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    In UK the 2017 PHV plugin corresponds to the US 2017 Prius Prime. I do have the factory alarm (VIP RS3200) and I did have the same experience you Haden the same year model 2017. I have lots to tell you but let me confirm if you have the Toyota VIP RSP3200 alarm as I do. You should see a decal on the driver side window saying VIP in red. If you bought it you would have a user manual RS3200 that they put in with your owners manuals. Unless you have the same system, what I tell you won’t help
     
  15. Tom B

    Tom B Junior Member

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    For the sake of time efficiency, I will relate my experience to see if others with intimate knowledge of this feature and the BODY ECU operation history report of the security alarm operation.
    On 8/8/2019 at 4 AM and 8/9 at 5 AM my Toyota VIP RS3200 alarm went off. Very annoying to the neighbors. On the second night I went right to the window, no one there. I learned the next day extensively about the alarm. There is no motion sensor only goes off if any entrance (doors, hood, trunk) are physically opened or the glass breakage sensor activates.) I frankly could not disturb the car enough to make the alarm go off, but I could test it by arming the alarm sitting inside. Even with fob present alarm goes off if you push the hood release or open a door. Takes 30 sec to arm the alarm.
    Since it was intermittent I asked the dealer how would he diagnose it? He said their techstream OBD tool can examine car events. Great so I documented for them the dates and times I got a false alarm and the dates and times when I created my own false alarms.
    They ran their sophisticated tool and got a history with precise dates and times of alarm events from the body ECU. With this multi million dollar tooling I have to tell you there were unresolvable problems with their analysis. I don’t know what to think, what to do and how to live with this problem!
    The dates and times of my false alarms did not show up in the history! But my tests did. I will post the history here and look at the junk I found in this multi million dollar analysis. Every item with a check was my tests. Fine so far. The glass sensor based alarm below my check marks on 8/8 and 8/9 may make sense but I did not record notes on that because the horn and lights alarm did not go off when I tested it. In addition the log entries below key cycle 166 on 8/8 seem to be screwed up. The key cycle is a good way to tell if data is corrupted. It is a record of the nth time the car was started. From the bottom up it should always be increasing. You will notice below 8/8 the counts go up and down and show alarm events that I don’t think happened. It is interesting that there is an alarm event once at 3:04 AM and another near it at 4:40 AM but the dates and key cycles are ridiculous.
    Now on 8/9 I checked the 12v battery it was more than 12 volts - my meter swung to its max and I did not bother to check how far it went.

    What the dealer said: this is the sad part:
    They said when I brought the car in the 12v battery was 10 volts. They said they use a special $8000 device that tests the battery in some special way, with a load they said. They said 10 volts is not enough to run the computer tests. It is at this point that I think they were making up things. They said they charged the battery for me to restore its life. I told them I tested the battery, they said not good enough our tester says something else. I told them on 8/5 I came back from a 320 mile trip. It should be charged! They said no it could still be weak because you don’t drive the car often and that is a known problem with these cars. Is my battery bad I asked? They said we don’t think so but we recommend you leave it on trickle charging when not in use. I told them it is in my driveway I cannot do that. I asked more shouldn’t a 320 mile drive charge the battery, they said not necessarily if you don’t use the car frequently. I didn’t know what to say to them, I don’t know what to think. It’s possible a long drive with AC does not perform proper battery management. Regular cars alternators are always charging the battery. What happens here? I told them I think they are not convincing. They kept on their point that their $8000 special Toyota analyzer said my battery wasn’t strong enough. After 8/9 I did my tests and then the alarm did not go off anymore and those log entries are properly recorded. Before that the log entries don’t make sense and perhaps the car was malfunctioning. I find it hard to believe the battery was too weak because it functioned fine from 8/9 to 8/13. 8/13 is when it was serviced and they refreshed the battery. But there were no problems from 8/9 9am to 8/13! Why didn’t it screw up then if the battery was so weak. I think there may be some serious defect but they don’t t want to look at that angle - they won’t bring it up with Toyota and I don’t know what to do! Am I supposed to just wait for the alarm to go off again? I can’t rely on a long trip to charge the battery? What is the truth and what is a lie? On 4/19 we used the accessory voltage and drained the battery and had to have AAA jump our battery. But log entries before and after that are all bad. Honestly Toyota has many lawsuits I don’t know if they are interested in this. I don’t know who would work on it. I expected by now they would have firmware updates for the car but it seems Toyota does not really do that.

    If you have this feature, I definitely recommend you have the dealer dump the same report and see if the same thing happened to you. Then at least there would be two of us. Certainly if your dealer’s service is better, I would like to hear what they did. We don’t get very good service where I live, the dealers are busy making money on oil changes, tires, and unnecessary repairs.

    The report is posted as a photo to this reply. Hope real Toyota personnel may be watching this. 7C184BC0-D1FA-4A40-9316-592C134EBCF5.jpeg