Strange anti-theft device came in my MS3

[Lee456]

Thanks for all the responses. I'll be talking to the dealer about it. If it's an alarm that they just "de-activated" they either need to activate it and give me the control or take it out. Even if it is well installed I've had aftermarket alarms fail and there's no reason to take that chance for a device that isn't doing anything for me just because they didn't want to take it out. I needed to make sure that I was right in thinking they had put it in, and you'e confirmed that for me. Now I'm going to start with the salesman, because he's a nice enough guy and I don't want to go over his head to start with. He's got the day off today and so I left him a voice mail. We'll see where it goes from there.

 

[TropicalDelight]

omg someone found it...that is the device that is set up to cause problems at certain milege intervals, such as turbo smoking.

Everyone hurry and remove it from their ms3's.

 

[Super X]

omg someone found it...that is the device that is set up to cause problems at certain milege intervals, such as turbo smoking.

Everyone hurry and remove it from their ms3's.

...Lame

 

[Lee456]

Just to wrap this up, I talked to the salesman yesterday and he said they'd take it out. They do put them in all the cars. The device locks the doors and disables the ignition after the car has been turned off for a relatively short period of time. I don't know what else it does. They do it because they have had big problems with auto theft in that area and theft of shift knobs and other items out of cars on the lot. They hope to sell the device to people who are buying a car that has no built in alarm.

Whoever said there was probably a matching plug near the device must have been right. I couldn't find such a plug, but it was a real tight spot where it was mounted. The car was only out of my sight for about 10 minutes and when I got it home and took the panel off the device was gone and there was no sign it had been there. No wires with crimp connectors or anything else to be seen.

 

[NiteRunner]

I know this is a little late, but good thing you had them remove it. I didn't hear anyone mention a repo application. Many dealers install devises like this that can immobilize a vehicle when the owner fails to make payments. I bought a used car just last year that had one. They make them look like aftermarket alarms, so the buyer leaves them in. Later if you don't make payments they can kill your engine, and your remote won't work. If you paid in full, they have no right to leave it in.