Stereo LOC'ed, Unlock method? 1992 Olds '88
Jeff Walther
displayed LOC and will not work. My parents are the original owners and
know nothing about any anti-theft system. So I read the Owner's Manual
and there is no mention of this LOC "feature" anywhere in the manual.
I've done a bit of searching on the web and found a method that involves
holding down either the 2 & 3 keys or the Set key, but neither of these
methods appear to work on this model. I suspect those methods only work
on newer models.
Anyone know a way of unlocking this that will save me from paying the
dealership $40? I wouldn't mind paying if it was my oversight, but the
fact that there's no mention of any such system in the Owner's Manual just
steams me to no end. I called the GM "Customer Service" line but they
just referred me to paying bucks at the dealership. I explained to them
that this was hardly fair given that there was no mention of this system
in the documentation, and they blew me off.
Alternatively, if there's not a simple known method of unlocking the
thing, how do I remove it from the dash? I don't see any obvious joints
or screws. I bet the code is either maintained by NVRAM running off a
small internal battery or on an EEPROM or FLASH which I can erase with my
handy dandy EEPROM programmer.
Thank you for any helpful or humorous comments.
--
A friend will help you move. A real friend will help you move a body.
Robert Hancock
Delco and getting the master unlock code for the radio. The trick with the 2
and 3 keys just gets you the number that you give Delco so that they can
give you the code. It's an automated telephone system that's used, but you
need a valid dealer code to access it.
If the radio has had too many attempts at the code, it won't even give you
that number, then you have to let it sit powered up for a full hour before
you can do anything more with it.
To get the radio out, you need to remove whatever dash trim covers the
outside edge of the radio. There will be some screws on the left and right
to hold it into the dash.
As far as unlocking it by nuking the memory chip, I would be surprised if
the chip were not soldered to the circuit board, and most likely erasing it
would just make the radio completely inoperative..
It's rather bizarre that the radio would have Theftlock on it but that it
wouldn't be mentioned in the manual. Are you sure it's the original radio?
Somebody would have to have programmed in a code to activate the Theftlock,
too..
--
Robert Hancock Saskatoon, SK, Canada
To email, remove "nospam" from hanc...@nospamshaw.ca
Home Page: http://www.roberthancock.com/
"Jeff Walther" <tr...@io.com> wrote in message
news:trag-23060...@aus-as2-044.io.com...
Jeff Walther
Hancock" <hanc...@nospamshaw.ca> wrote:
> To get the radio out, you need to remove whatever dash trim covers the
> outside edge of the radio. There will be some screws on the left and right
> to hold it into the dash.
I managed to get the dash trim off. It turns out there were five torx
screws holding it on, which I had overlooked before. I found the four
screws on the front of the stereo. But there seems to be a strap or
something on the inside holding it in, and I have no idea how to access
that. Maybe if I could get the ashtray out...But from feeling around
under the dash, it feels liek the thing is in a plastic sleeve, so I don't
think that will help. I hate working under the dash. Arghh.
> As far as unlocking it by nuking the memory chip, I would be surprised if
> the chip were not soldered to the circuit board, and most likely erasing it
> would just make the radio completely inoperative..
Desoldering the chip is no problem. Especially on something from 1992.
I would first copy the contents and then nuke the chip. If that is
catastrophic, I can then reprogram the chip with the original contents.
Having one's own chip programmer is expensive but very convenient.
> It's rather bizarre that the radio would have Theftlock on it but that it
> wouldn't be mentioned in the manual. Are you sure it's the original radio?
> Somebody would have to have programmed in a code to activate the Theftlock,
> too..
Well, I think it is bizarre too. Yes, it's the original radio. My
parent's are the original owners. I don't think they've ever bought an
after-market radio in their entire lives.
A nice service rep at a local dealership told me that the code is
typically included on a little card with the car, but my parents were
never given that card. They have all the paperwork for every car they've
bought back to 1975. So the manual says nothing about theftlock and they
were never given the code (presumably factory programmed) and GM still
expects us to pay to get it unlocked. It's amazing so many folks
continue to buy GM...
The one mysterious bit is that somebody would have to have programmed in a
code to activate it. My parents never did as they had no idea the
feature existed. The service guy said they sometimes came with a code
programmed at the factory, so that would solve that mystery. However, my
father says he's replaced the battery himself a number of times and never
had this problem. So unless there's some capacitance in the thing and he
replaced the battery pretty quick, it sounds like the theftlock somehow
got activated on its own or the AC guys fiddled wtih it just wrong?
danclan
instrument cluster.
You will need to remove the steering column trim cover first then unscrew
the face plate and remove it from the dash.
This will allow you to get at the mounting nuts for the radio.
The antenna and power leads are on the backside of the radio and are usually
fairly short. This makes it some what fun to disconnect them when removing
the radio.
Sometimes you will need to disassemble the ashtray and/or the glove box to
access the connections.
What happened is your repair guys must have disconnected the ground side of
the battery when they were working on the AC. The dealer is the only one
that can reestablish your radio if you do not know the secret code. There
should have been some paper work with the car that has that code written
down. The Delco Loc is not on all GM vehicles so it probably is not in the
owners manual.
I hope this helps.
RAD in California
"Jeff Walther" <tr...@io.com> wrote in message
news:trag-23060...@aus-as2-044.io.com...
Robert Hancock
models of the radio had the Theftlock on them and some didn't, just that the
option was turned off on some of them, and somehow this radio has decided
that it has Theftlock on it..
I've never heard of a radio having pre-programmed Theftlock on it - it
always comes disabled from the factory, and you have to enter in a code to
enable it.
Does it have the blinking Theftlock LED on the front of the radio?
As far as taking it out, it's likely that some of the cables on the back are
hung up and preventing it from coming out, you might have to reach in behind
to unplug them.
--
Robert Hancock Saskatoon, SK, Canada
To email, remove "nospam" from hanc...@nospamshaw.ca
Home Page: http://www.roberthancock.com/
"Jeff Walther" <tr...@io.com> wrote in message
news:trag-24060...@aus-as2-161.io.com...
crodriguez
You have invested WAY MORE time and effort
then the 40 bucks the dealer wanted.
It's amazing reading you posts, talking about
desoldering the chip, fighting the dash board, calling
GM, writing posts, all over the course of two days.
And your still no where near finishing. You have
no idea if the chip nuking will work!!
Are you that cheap that $40 is worth this much effort?
You could have had this "problem" solved last week.
Richard Yates
much as the $40 but the principle of the whole situation. My keyless entry
remote to my car had been lost and I needed to replace it. The dealer wanted
$75 for the remote and $50 to program it. I turned to the Newsgroup for
suggestions. The final results were, I got the remotes on E-Bay for $10 and
a user in the Newsgroup gave me programming instructions and it took all of
5 seconds and a paperclip to make it work!
"crodriguez" <crodr...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:XY2cnbmN5s7...@comcast.com...
crodriguez
Maybe he will let us know if a paper clip helps him............
Jeff Walther
Hancock" <hanc...@nospamshaw.ca> wrote:
> It's also possible the radio is somehow confused
I am leaning toward this theory, because of further discussion with my
father. He says that the times he changed the battery it was usually out
for an hour or more. He would take the old battery out, take it to the
store, exchange it for the new battery (core charge) adn then install the
new one. So it wasn't like he was trading them out in one quick change.
Yet, he never had this problem when he changed the battery.
On the other hand, electronics don't really get confused. They're fairly
deterministic things...mostly. I half-way suspect that someone at the AC
place installed a theft code on it while it was there, but why would they
bother? That doesn't make much sense either.
>
> I've never heard of a radio having pre-programmed Theftlock on it - it
> always comes disabled from the factory, and you have to enter in a code to
> enable it.
>
> Does it have the blinking Theftlock LED on the front of the radio?
There is no LED on this radio. There is the LED display which displays
characters such as the radio frequency and the time, but no single LED
light. The LED display simply displays "LOC" now. I understand that
there were at least two and possibly three versions of Delco's theftlock
schemes each with slightly different names. This one would be from 1992
or earlier since the car came with this stereo in 1992.
> As far as taking it out, it's likely that some of the cables on the back are
> hung up and preventing it from coming out, you might have to reach in behind
> to unplug them.
That is a possibility. I'm having trouble figuring out how to get my hand
back there without growing an additional wrist...
Jeff Walther
Yates" <richar...@attbi.com> wrote:
> "crodriguez" <crodr...@comcast.net> wrote in message
> news:XY2cnbmN5s7...@comcast.com...
> > Here is a very good point.........
> >
> >
> > You have invested WAY MORE time and effort
> > then the 40 bucks the dealer wanted.
> >
> > It's amazing reading you posts, talking about
> > desoldering the chip, fighting the dash board, calling
> > GM, writing posts, all over the course of two days.
> > And your still no where near finishing. You have
> > no idea if the chip nuking will work!!
> >
> > Are you that cheap that $40 is worth this much effort?
> > You could have had this "problem" solved last week.
> I can understand where this guy is coming from. I do not think that it is so
> much as the $40 but the principle of the whole situation. My keyless entry
> remote to my car had been lost and I needed to replace it. The dealer wanted
> $75 for the remote and $50 to program it. I turned to the Newsgroup for
> suggestions. The final results were, I got the remotes on E-Bay for $10 and
> a user in the Newsgroup gave me programming instructions and it took all of
> 5 seconds and a paperclip to make it work!
Exactly. Thank you for your understanding. I will not pay GM for this.
They never informed us that there was such a hazard built into the stereo
that we paid for, nor did they provide the theft code. Yet, they will
neither provide the info needed to undo this, nor provide the service to
undo it without a ridiculous charge. No way am I ever giving GM any
money. Of course, my parents will continue to buy GM cars as they always
have, but that's their decision.
Additionally, despite having an EE degree, 1.5 years of experience
designing semiconductors, great references and a 3.6 GPA coming out of
school three years ago, I've been looking for work for the last eighteen
months, unsuccessfully. So my time isn't worth a whole lot right now
anyway, and a little project like this to take my mind off the depressing
reality of the current job market is just fine. Of course, I don't count
in the "unemployment" statistics, because like so many others, my
unemployment benefits ran out a long time ago and you aren't counted as
unemployed after that, despite the continuing lack of a job...but I
digress.
I like soldering. I like desoldering. I like programming chips. The
mechanical aspects of removing the stereo from the car are frustrating,
but once I get to the electronic technician stuff, that will be fun.
Finally, I will buy a new stereo and install it, before I will consider
giving GM any money. So, figuring out how to uninstall the stereo is a
necessary step, whether I manage to hack the current stereo back into
operation, or junk it and replace it with something else.
Richard Yates
thing.... Is it possible that all you need to do is enter a code to unlock
it? Seems to me they would provide that as a Customer Service after you
proved ownership. Furthermore, what does LOC stand for? Could it be an
Acronym for Launch Operations Center? One suggestion is find the model and
contact the manufacturer and ask them for advice. Keep posting in here and
other Newsgroups.... Don't give up!
BTW I used to own a '92 Delta 88 and never had that problem.... Worse thing
that ever happened to me was that I got that "Clean Key" Message and you
would have to wait 3 minutes or so before the car would start. I now own a
'91 Regency 98 but would be more than happy to to some research on this for
you!
Gravity
--
---------------------------------------------
:-D I just cut the cheese!
"Jeff Walther" <tr...@io.com> wrote in message
news:trag-24060...@aus-as2-026.io.com...
Jeff Walther
<jef...@fuels.homeip.net> wrote:
> Try just disconnecting the battery for a bit?
That worked. I figured, what the heck, it's easy and cheap. When I put
the ground connector back on the battery, the Stereo came up displaying
1:00 and now it works fine.
I am at a loss to explain it. Loc should not be enabled. It's never
caused a problem before. They (the selling dealership) didn't tell us
there was any such feature nor provide any documentation.
It appeared out of the blue. It shouldn't go away when one disconnects
and reconnects the battery, but it did.
I thought about trying this earlier but didn't see how it could solve a
problem with an "anti-theft" program. I should have tried it right
away. It woudl have saved me a bunch of effort.
Oh, and for anyone who needs the info, I figured out how to remove the
stereo. After you remove the four screws in the front at the four
corners of the stereo, look near the middle of hte front plate of the
stereo. Let your eyes drift down to the bottom edge of the stereo and
right there you'll see a plastic well. About 3" into that well, there's
a fifth screw (torx of the same size as the others) which holds a little
bracket near the bottom of the stereo. You've got to remove that fifth
screw and then the stereo comes out easily.
Thank you to all who stopped by and offered advice.
Michael
>Additionally, despite having an EE degree, 1.5 years of experience
>designing semiconductors, great references and a 3.6 GPA coming out of
>school three years ago, I've been looking for work for the last eighteen
>months, unsuccessfully.
You brought back the 1970's for me. When the Viet Nam war and the
airospace industries declined. (For good reasons)
>I like soldering. I like desoldering. I like programming chips.
What do you do if they are surface mounted technology chips? Or propriety
chips with secret markings?
>mechanical aspects of removing the stereo from the car are frustrating,
>but once I get to the electronic technician stuff, that will be fun.
And then realize that you have waisted all your time.
>Finally, I will buy a new stereo and install it, before I will consider
>giving GM any money. So, figuring out how to uninstall the stereo is a
>necessary step, whether I manage to hack the current stereo back into
>operation, or junk it and replace it with something else.
Now here you have solved your problem already. Life is full of learning
experiences. Whether it be auto repair, or unemployment. You will learn
from it all.
MIKE........
PS: I read in the NY Times last month that BMW is employing technicians at
their dealerships and paying them >$50,000 to start. And have their
own training program. Unbelievable!
David
can tell you first hand digital electronics designs get confused often. It
is a VERY common repair problem for many electronics manufactures.
Things like a glitch of noise on the power, bad ground connection, nearby
EMP (like that generated by an MRI machine), nearby static discharge at just
the wrong time, and many more can all cause electronics to be confused.
Actually it is a changed code in memory or the firmware that really fouls
things up.
David
> On the other hand, electronics don't really get confused. They're fairly
> deterministic things...mostly. I half-way suspect that someone at the AC
> place installed a theft code on it while it was there, but why would they
> bother? That doesn't make much sense either.
> >
.
David
Anyone with some real experience at the service end of consumer electronics
can attest to how common this type of failure really is and that a full
reboot/reset many times clears the problem.
Obviously your EE degree training did not give you any real world practical
knowledge from the repair standpoint.
When I worked at a consumer electronics repair shop, around 25% of the
failures we would see were due to random electronics confusion problems.
Usually some bit would get corrupted in the eeprom, sometimes the
micro/system control would get confused due to some bad data getting to it,
almost all problems were related to quick brown out conditions at just the
wrong time.
David
Jeff Walther <tr...@io.com> wrote in message
news:trag-27060...@aus-as2-144.io.com...
Leslie Wow
Same thing happened to me. Never locked it, had it off battery for long
periods of time - but one time it locked on me. I just assumed my kids did
it.
Here is what happened though, I had my old cassette player still so I
put it back in, threw the locked one in the trunk - figured I would get it
unlocked from the dealer one day or buy another factory cd.
Well, several months later (and still broke enough to get it fixed)
winter ended, since I work on Computers, I know that most bios (don't ask if
you don't know) memory can be reset just by unplugging the battery - or if
you are a video gameplayer, ask yourself, what happens to your saved games
if you leave an old video game cartridge with built in ram laying around for
awhile?
You already know that answer.....
Bingo! I put it in and the "loc" was gone!
Dennis
"Jeff Walther" <tr...@io.com> wrote in message
news:trag-23060...@aus-as2-044.io.com...
Muffet
Well my stero just went to loc and no change of battery or nothing "different"
than everyday travels and listening to radio....now i dont have one i
guess😔 Tried the 2. 3. Buttons no luck...this just sucks.
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