Dead battery, No key to unlock trunk.
08-18-2016, 12:16 PM
#1
Instructor
Thread Starter
Dead battery, No key to unlock trunk.
Had a situation happen to me yesterday, and just wanted to share in case someone else were to have the same issue.
The dilemma was yesterday morning, the battery died. Right as I'm leaving to work, I get in and it won't turn over. Only enough juice was left to open the doors. I'm pretty tilted at this point, so I shut my door and just rode with my wife to get to work that morning. On the way to work, once I stopped being so upset, I realized that I should of left the door open or at least the windows down while the battery still had a bit of power. Reason being that I lost my only key to be able to open the trunk, and haven't made it a priority to go to the dealership to get another made. So on my way back home, we pick up a battery and I'm praying that I can at least open the door. NO LUCK!
So here's the information that may help anyone in the future as to how to get into your car, if you have a dead battery & no key to open your trunk.
I took the new battery I just picked up, and some speaker wire that I had laying around.
I then took a torx bit, and unscrewed a tail light. (Either one will work I'm assuming, but I did the inside right tail light.)
Pulled the tail light out, and unplug it.
You're left with the connector with 1 green wire & 2 black wires.
Green wire I believe is the positive, and the black wire on the outside (not the black wire in the middle) is the negative.
I connected the speaker wire to the positive and negative ends on the connector.
Then processed to wrap the positive wire to the positive terminal on the battery FIRST.
Then I just touched the negative wire to the negative terminal to make contact.
At this point there was enough juice in the system, so I grabbed my fob and pressed the trunk release button. And wallah, the trunk popped.
Now you can reverse the steps to get your tail light put back together.
And now with the trunk open, you have the ability to pull the driver side door cable to unlock the door, open your door and pop your hood to replace/charge the battery.
Figured if this information was useful to me, it might be useful to someone else doing a search on the forum or google. Hoping it gets some sort of visibility.
The dilemma was yesterday morning, the battery died. Right as I'm leaving to work, I get in and it won't turn over. Only enough juice was left to open the doors. I'm pretty tilted at this point, so I shut my door and just rode with my wife to get to work that morning. On the way to work, once I stopped being so upset, I realized that I should of left the door open or at least the windows down while the battery still had a bit of power. Reason being that I lost my only key to be able to open the trunk, and haven't made it a priority to go to the dealership to get another made. So on my way back home, we pick up a battery and I'm praying that I can at least open the door. NO LUCK!
So here's the information that may help anyone in the future as to how to get into your car, if you have a dead battery & no key to open your trunk.
I took the new battery I just picked up, and some speaker wire that I had laying around.
I then took a torx bit, and unscrewed a tail light. (Either one will work I'm assuming, but I did the inside right tail light.)
Pulled the tail light out, and unplug it.
You're left with the connector with 1 green wire & 2 black wires.
Green wire I believe is the positive, and the black wire on the outside (not the black wire in the middle) is the negative.
I connected the speaker wire to the positive and negative ends on the connector.
Then processed to wrap the positive wire to the positive terminal on the battery FIRST.
Then I just touched the negative wire to the negative terminal to make contact.
At this point there was enough juice in the system, so I grabbed my fob and pressed the trunk release button. And wallah, the trunk popped.
Now you can reverse the steps to get your tail light put back together.
And now with the trunk open, you have the ability to pull the driver side door cable to unlock the door, open your door and pop your hood to replace/charge the battery.
Figured if this information was useful to me, it might be useful to someone else doing a search on the forum or google. Hoping it gets some sort of visibility.
The following 3 users liked this post by Spiderxkx:
08-18-2016, 01:08 PM
#3
Burning Brakes
Had a situation happen to me yesterday, and just wanted to share in case someone else were to have the same issue.
The dilemma was yesterday morning, the battery died. Right as I'm leaving to work, I get in and it won't turn over. Only enough juice was left to open the doors. I'm pretty tilted at this point, so I shut my door and just rode with my wife to get to work that morning. On the way to work, once I stopped being so upset, I realized that I should of left the door open or at least the windows down while the battery still had a bit of power. Reason being that I lost my only key to be able to open the trunk, and haven't made it a priority to go to the dealership to get another made. So on my way back home, we pick up a battery and I'm praying that I can at least open the door. NO LUCK!
So here's the information that may help anyone in the future as to how to get into your car, if you have a dead battery & no key to open your trunk.
I took the new battery I just picked up, and some speaker wire that I had laying around.
I then took a torx bit, and unscrewed a tail light. (Either one will work I'm assuming, but I did the inside right tail light.)
Pulled the tail light out, and unplug it.
You're left with the connector with 1 green wire & 2 black wires.
Green wire I believe is the positive, and the black wire on the outside (not the black wire in the middle) is the negative.
I connected the speaker wire to the positive and negative ends on the connector.
Then processed to wrap the positive wire to the positive terminal on the battery FIRST.
Then I just touched the negative wire to the negative terminal to make contact.
At this point there was enough juice in the system, so I grabbed my fob and pressed the trunk release button. And wallah, the trunk popped.
Now you can reverse the steps to get your tail light put back together.
And now with the trunk open, you have the ability to pull the driver side door cable to unlock the door, open your door and pop your hood to replace/charge the battery.
Figured if this information was useful to me, it might be useful to someone else doing a search on the forum or google. Hoping it gets some sort of visibility.
The dilemma was yesterday morning, the battery died. Right as I'm leaving to work, I get in and it won't turn over. Only enough juice was left to open the doors. I'm pretty tilted at this point, so I shut my door and just rode with my wife to get to work that morning. On the way to work, once I stopped being so upset, I realized that I should of left the door open or at least the windows down while the battery still had a bit of power. Reason being that I lost my only key to be able to open the trunk, and haven't made it a priority to go to the dealership to get another made. So on my way back home, we pick up a battery and I'm praying that I can at least open the door. NO LUCK!
So here's the information that may help anyone in the future as to how to get into your car, if you have a dead battery & no key to open your trunk.
I took the new battery I just picked up, and some speaker wire that I had laying around.
I then took a torx bit, and unscrewed a tail light. (Either one will work I'm assuming, but I did the inside right tail light.)
Pulled the tail light out, and unplug it.
You're left with the connector with 1 green wire & 2 black wires.
Green wire I believe is the positive, and the black wire on the outside (not the black wire in the middle) is the negative.
I connected the speaker wire to the positive and negative ends on the connector.
Then processed to wrap the positive wire to the positive terminal on the battery FIRST.
Then I just touched the negative wire to the negative terminal to make contact.
At this point there was enough juice in the system, so I grabbed my fob and pressed the trunk release button. And wallah, the trunk popped.
Now you can reverse the steps to get your tail light put back together.
And now with the trunk open, you have the ability to pull the driver side door cable to unlock the door, open your door and pop your hood to replace/charge the battery.
Figured if this information was useful to me, it might be useful to someone else doing a search on the forum or google. Hoping it gets some sort of visibility.
08-18-2016, 01:27 PM
#6
Instructor
Thread Starter
08-18-2016, 01:41 PM
#8
Instructor
Thread Starter
Regardless, the end result would of been the same.
08-18-2016, 01:50 PM
#9
Melting Slicks
I did pul the cable in the trunk once to make sure it worked which it did. My question is, how does that lower the window to open the door?
08-18-2016, 02:14 PM
#10
Le Mans Master
Window will not seal properly against the seal if you try to close the door with the window completely up. In fact you have some resistance in closing the door if you cant lower the window a bit.
08-18-2016, 03:14 PM
#11
Le Mans Master
Having a hard time seeing how this would have worked.
The +/- wires at the tail light are not constantly connected -- only when the lights are on or turn signal has been activated. Otherwise the tail light bulb would be constantly lit while you are parked.
So supplying power to the wiring in the light bulb connector shouldn't complete *any* circuit, and thus shouldn't supply any power to enable the latches to work.
Thoughts?
Maybe it was coincidence that with a low battery, the trunk was able to pop at that time?
The +/- wires at the tail light are not constantly connected -- only when the lights are on or turn signal has been activated. Otherwise the tail light bulb would be constantly lit while you are parked.
So supplying power to the wiring in the light bulb connector shouldn't complete *any* circuit, and thus shouldn't supply any power to enable the latches to work.
Thoughts?
Maybe it was coincidence that with a low battery, the trunk was able to pop at that time?
08-18-2016, 04:43 PM
#12
Instructor
Thread Starter
Having a hard time seeing how this would have worked.
The +/- wires at the tail light are not constantly connected -- only when the lights are on or turn signal has been activated. Otherwise the tail light bulb would be constantly lit while you are parked.
So supplying power to the wiring in the light bulb connector shouldn't complete *any* circuit, and thus shouldn't supply any power to enable the latches to work.
Thoughts?
Maybe it was coincidence that with a low battery, the trunk was able to pop at that time?
The +/- wires at the tail light are not constantly connected -- only when the lights are on or turn signal has been activated. Otherwise the tail light bulb would be constantly lit while you are parked.
So supplying power to the wiring in the light bulb connector shouldn't complete *any* circuit, and thus shouldn't supply any power to enable the latches to work.
Thoughts?
Maybe it was coincidence that with a low battery, the trunk was able to pop at that time?
08-18-2016, 04:47 PM
#13
Racer
Having a hard time seeing how this would have worked.
The +/- wires at the tail light are not constantly connected -- only when the lights are on or turn signal has been activated. Otherwise the tail light bulb would be constantly lit while you are parked.
So supplying power to the wiring in the light bulb connector shouldn't complete *any* circuit, and thus shouldn't supply any power to enable the latches to work.
Thoughts?
Maybe it was coincidence that with a low battery, the trunk was able to pop at that time?
The +/- wires at the tail light are not constantly connected -- only when the lights are on or turn signal has been activated. Otherwise the tail light bulb would be constantly lit while you are parked.
So supplying power to the wiring in the light bulb connector shouldn't complete *any* circuit, and thus shouldn't supply any power to enable the latches to work.
Thoughts?
Maybe it was coincidence that with a low battery, the trunk was able to pop at that time?
Great info!!
The following 2 users liked this post by Kent1999:
FortMorganAl (08-19-2016),
Prb1948 (12-11-2022)
08-18-2016, 06:52 PM
#16
Le Mans Master
No disrespect either, but there is no logic to this being the reason the trunk opened. Unless, in some unexplained way, by powering the tail light you somehow caused the BCM to complete a circuit backwards.
What is more logical to me - batteries do not go completely dead. If the battery was significantly low, then there was a significant reduction in the antenna receptivity. I'm betting that, by luck, you were in the best spot to make contact with the security antenna which popped the trunk.
What is more logical to me - batteries do not go completely dead. If the battery was significantly low, then there was a significant reduction in the antenna receptivity. I'm betting that, by luck, you were in the best spot to make contact with the security antenna which popped the trunk.
08-18-2016, 07:25 PM
#18
Racer
...I am glad you got into your car and were able to replace the battery!
08-18-2016, 07:31 PM
#19
Le Mans Master
The thing is - the BCM powers the car's security, so in an unexplainable way, this connect could have powered up the BCM, isolated from the CAN, which, in turn powered up the antenna. If so....I don't have a good feeling about this...
