Yes, when the car is running and the wire is cut, Passlock decides that there has been a Passlock system failure, not a theft attempt. The security light may come on (mine did) but the car will not shut off, and Passlock will disable itself. Then, any key that will turn the ignition cylinder will start the car. If you get your codes read, it should show a Passlock failure code. Once that code is cleared, Passlock will be reset, and again look for the correct resistance.
VATS may work a little differently, I am not very familiar with its specific logic, but I would guess it's about the same.

 

Ok, thanks for your help, I finally had the time to fix it yesterday evening. I found the cables comming from the ignition lock, followed them and saw that they ended in big something of insulating tape, where someone else one day installed an additional alarm system. He made a really bad job, because when I just pulled a little bit on the wires, they came out of the tape very easily, and blank ... so, after just measuring the resistance it was clear, that these were the cables I needed, switched on ignition and got the good old "clean key - wait 3 min". Ignition off, resistor in between the blank cables (freed from tape) and ignition on: the security light went off instantly, and I could start putting everything back again in the right position.
Now I don't have to worry about worn out contacts, keys, passlock failures ... thanks again, you helped me a lot
Btw. sorry for the incorrect mail ... I just saw it now, that I forgot a dot ...

 

Passlock, fuel system, trac off.....oh my!

Okay I am loving the information on here and I WANT to believe it, but I am stuck on one thing:

1999 olds alero V6 2 door. While driving it dies like it was unplugged. MIGHT sputter once - I'll catch my rps's dip..then a min or two later it cuts off. I sit and try to start it until it starts. Sometimes 3 min, sometimes 10 minutes. NO flashing SECURITY light. Sometimes I get in it and it doesnt start. No flashing security light. I turn ignition to on - HEAR my fuel pump humming, then try to crank it and it cranks rough like its getting no fuel. After a few min it starts and runs like a champ (thats why this is frustrating - when it runs, it runs great). I'm afraid to drive it now since it is unpredictable. I have been going 25 MPH and 40 MPH and it just shuts off - no power, no nothing. If it is the Passlock I am amazed GM would not recall this unsafe thing - dying while driving - but alot of the posts talk about flashing security lights..mine stays on with the check engine light and various others.

There are GREAT posts on here with the same symptoms, but a lot of stories of "and I dropped 300 bucks on X and it worked for a week then the problem came back..blah..blah..." I am broke as a joke, so I cant waste money replacing working parts. Help?

 

Hi everybody!
I´m new in this forum and, coming from Austria, hope that my english is good enough. I am driving a Olds Alero, first registered in August 1999 here in Europe. I hope that there are no differences between US-cars and exported cars as far as the passlock/passkey/theftlock system is concerned.
My car has about 140k kilometers (~88k miles), and the "Security"-problem has just began to show up.
I am very grateful for the solution outlined in this thread since I just talked to the local Chevy (over here they sold the Alero under the Chevy brand) dealer. The outlook was something around 700 EURO (about 1k US-Dollar), which seemed way to expensive to me.
Now, I´d like to try the resistor solution, but just to make sure that i´t´ll work for my car I need some help with the anti-theft systems, which I tend to confuse:
My car´s VIN is:
1G1NL52E3XC00097, Type 1NL69 ABAA
I am nut sure if my car has Passkey I, II, Passlock (I, II?). I remember seeing "Theftlock" somewhere in the manual, so I´m a bit confused.

Could anybody please help me so I can go to work before my car shuts down on the Autobahn?

Thank you!

Stevie

 

Theftlock is a system that prevents the radio for working if it is installed in another car. It is not related to Passlock II, which is what your Alero has.

The resistor method should work for your car. Be aware that if you cannot find a resistor with the correct resistance, you can link several together and add their resistances until you reach the correct resistance.

Your English is better than that of many people who were born speaking it

Let us know how the bypass works for you.

 

I had a local alarm shop wire in a resistor. Basically bypassing the passlock. No problems since. They charged me 60.00 I waited while they did the job about 20 mins. I had to call about 4 shops. Most knew of the problem but the one knew the resistor bypass.

 

I experienced this for awhile. Sometimes it would happen 6 or 7 times back to back. Sitting at a corner store with the security light flashing for over an hour in the hot and humid Florida summer is not fun. One day while under the hood I was messing around and noticed that the positive battery terminal bolt had screwed up threads and was not getting a good connection. I replaced the bolt with a new one and since then I have not had 1 issue with the passlock system.

 

After doing alot of reasearch on this problem like the hundreds that I have found all over the web, I have to learned there is no fix for this problem, I have also came to learn that this is a manufactures defect in the Anti-theft system that apparently GM and Oldsmobile does not want to take responsiblity for. So I came a across a site that was very interesting, and for all that has posted to this forum should look at. Its call the NHTSA, which is the National Highway Traffic Saftey Administration website, here is where we all need to send out compliants in and they will review them and this is a they determine if a car or parts of a car are subject to a recall...I contacted them after I filed my compliant and was told that there has to be a signifiant amount of people with this same problem for them to do something once a complaint is filed, and they WILL get something done..please pass this along to anyone you know that has an Oldsmobile or any car that is having this problem.....we need a fix for our cars. Here is the actual link to file the compaint http://www-odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/ivoq/index.cfm

 

Sorry, this is not going to be a recall, as it is not safety related. Passlock has been a problem on GM cars for more than 10 years, with many hundreds of thousands of vehicles affected. There is in fact a fix, see the first post.

 

Posts on 95 Cutlass Passkey 2 problem moved to Cutlass section.