centeral locking question

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Sun Jan 11, 2004 2:03 pm

as you might know the fto stock cenral locking is not that good, and just in the last few weeks has my passenger door lock become stuck. it locks fine but i have to manually open it. now i know i can get some better locking for around 60 - 70 bucks but my question is Should i get it profesionaly changed or is it easy enough to do it yourself?

i do not want to break the door doing this but if its easy enough i dont want to pay.

ruchi · Post by **ruchi** » Sun Jan 11, 2004 2:23 pm

Supposedly it is easy enough to do yourself, you can even find instructions on how to do it here: http://www.mitsubishi-fto.org/workshop/ ... index.html

But are you 100% sure that the issue is only the actuator?

In my case, I got a car alarm place to do it, and I'm glad I did as not only were my actuators weak but the way the car alarm had been programmed meant that it was applying a voltage to the actuators for a period that was MUCH longer than required, and this in turn was burning out the motors.

Even if I had just switched the actuators over, eventually the new ones would have also burnt out. For $200 the car alarm place put new actuators in both doors, reprogrammed the car alarm, and wired the folding mirrors to the door actuator, so that when I arm the car the mirrors fold in, and when I unarm the car they fold out again. Besides looking really cool, and freaking people out when they see this happen, it makes it really easy for me to tell if my car is armed or unarmed, all I have to do is look at the mirrors.

dAsh · Post by **dAsh** » Sun Jan 11, 2004 2:24 pm

You'll find the electric motor in the passenger door has run out of oomph.
Mine is shagged and won't even unlock or lock the door.
It's fiddly to get to, but very do-able yourself, easiest if you remove the window first.
I haven't done anything to mine yet except pull it apart to see how it works, there's a pissy little scalextric car type motor in their that'd be lucky to pull the skin off a rice pudding, it works when there's no load on it (i.e when it'slaying open in my hand) but under pressure, no longer has the guts to do anything. I've got mine out at the moment and will match it up with something a little beefier from Jaycar.
Will let you know what I come up with when I do (in a week or so)
Cheers, dAsh.

Robb · Post by **Robb** » Tue Jan 13, 2004 9:46 pm

I just installed new motors in my car its not that hard to do yourself.... biggest problem I had was getting the new wiring thru the the rubber S-sleeve in the door jam but the rest was pretty easy....

Robb...

G_A_V · Post by **G_A_V** » Tue Jan 13, 2004 11:19 pm

you shoulnt need new wiring just wire it up to the wires from the old motor

Robb · Post by **Robb** » Wed Jan 14, 2004 12:18 pm

Yeah I prolly could have but I couldn't work out which wires were which and I couldn't find the control unit (way too many wires and black boxes under the dash) and I wasn't sure what half of them did so I just installed the whole kit including the wiring.....

it wasn't too hard so I'm not too pissed about the extra work involved cos now that I have central again I'm falling in love with my car all over again....

Robb...

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Wed Jan 14, 2004 1:32 pm

RUCHI!! thank you, i decided i will get it professionnally done, but that little mod of yours where the mirrors fold in on arming the car!, i want it! i have wanted that for ages, i hate pressing the little button to do it. can you give me any info please on the cost, how long it takes, where you got it done and anything i might need to know. thank you again for help

ruchi · Post by **ruchi** » Wed Jan 14, 2004 2:10 pm

Raven, as the others have suggested replacing the motors / actuators is not difficult, so anyone that installs car alarms should have after-market actuators and should be able to do it easily.

Having said it is "easy" to do, personally I would still get a professional to do it, rather than doing it myself, so I don't stuff anything up and for warranty reasons etc.

For exactly $200, my local car alarm place provide two new actuators, which they wired to the existing wiring from the old burnt out ones, and connected the wiring to the folding mirrors. (Make sure you show them where the mirror switch is on the dash)

The mirrors fold and unfold when the door is locked and unlocked. So even if unarmed, if you flick the door lock, the mirrors will also fold, but you can still unfold them using the mirror switch on the dash.

The last thing they did was check the length of the voltage from the alarm to the actuators. A lot of alarms are set for 8 seconds, as this apparently is a Mercedes Benz requirement, but most actuators only needed a "pulse" of less than 2 seconds, anything longer and they can overheat. They attributed the fact that my alarm was set to 8 seconds as contributing to burning out the motors, as when they put the new ones in, they noticed that they too were getting hot. They then re-programmed my alarm, and it now does a short pulse and the actuators no longer get hot.

The whole thing took them around 2-3 hours to do.

Again, for anyone that installs alarms, this should be straight-forward, just make sure you tell them everything you want done, and get a price up-front for both the parts and labour. You may even be able to get a better deal than I did!

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Thu Jan 15, 2004 11:44 am

thanks again Ruchi, i gonna check some places out as soon as i get a break from work.

ruchi · Post by **ruchi** » Thu Jan 15, 2004 11:54 am

let us know how you go.

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Thu Jan 15, 2004 1:09 pm

ya can do, but im in melbourne for next 2 weeks on work, and i gota wait to get back to brissie before i can do anything, but ya i will keep you posted.

FTO338 · Post by **FTO338** » Thu Jan 15, 2004 9:22 pm

Hey u coming down the next 2 wks? well looks like u need a treat (show u around) from some of the Melb FTO's owner heeehehe, well that if this is your first time in Melb.

either way let us know

GPXXX · Post by **GPXXX** » Thu Jan 15, 2004 10:23 pm

cool, we might have a mini meet on the 1st Feb with the regulars and catch up for a drink then. I believe Craig is also driving down to Melbourne from Sydney (with his FTO as well) so yeah we could all get together and catch up for drinks or something... afterall I still have those stickers to hand out anyway (in time for the cruise on the 29/2) so it'll be a good opportunity to discuss about the cruise as well while we're at it...

New members are more than welcome to come along and meet up the crew.

Who's interested?

ruchi · Post by **ruchi** » Thu Jan 15, 2004 11:10 pm

I'm in, name the place and time (and put it in the VIC area)

Post by **Supplanter** » Fri Jan 16, 2004 8:34 am

I'm in, since I missed the last one

Craig · Post by **Craig** » Fri Jan 16, 2004 9:06 am

hey all
I'm driving with the FTO to melbourne this saturday.. and i'll be down there till the 13th feb
I'll be at Watsonia-greensborough... so its not far from the city...
So if u guys are having a small cruise let me know for sure.. i'll be there
just give me some notice and i'll not drink the night before...

otherwise if theres no cruise i'll catch up for some drinks for sure!

Raven · Post by **Raven** » Fri Jan 16, 2004 11:10 am

hey coool! im am so up for that, i am in melbourne now but my ride is still in brissie, craig! i am out at watsonia / greensbough to maby i could grab a ride if we plan drinks somewhere?

Craig · Post by **Craig** » Fri Jan 16, 2004 11:33 am

Sounds good champ
i'll be at the army base there...
don't know when i'll be able to check the internet while i'm down there
so mobile number is 0412 576 971

ruchi · Post by **ruchi** » Fri Jan 16, 2004 11:49 am

There is now a message about this mini-meet in the VIC area, so please post any further messages / responses there.

GPXXX · Post by **GPXXX** » Sun Feb 08, 2004 8:55 pm

dammit, looks like its my turn to have problems with my car... the central locking is now playing up on my driver's door. HELP...!!