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Rogue radio station disables key fobs

We had a similar problem in the UK, that turned out to be an incorrectly set-up Cell tower. Cars affected included Renault, VW, Audi & Vauxhall (GM). The cars wouldn't start as the signal jammed the transponder in the key. Fixed after a couple of days (And a very apologetic engineer)
 
pastafarian said:
Hollywood: Cops say pirate radio jammed electronic car keys - South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com


Kind of funny, not so much for those affected. A statement of our times that some had their cars towed because they could no longer figure out how to use a key.
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LOL...OTOH I don't have any right-side door locks on either of my cars. Just the other day I went to open a locked door, only to realize that the door had no key slot.

Both my cars also have transponders in the ignition keys. I wonder if they were affected? I don't know what frequency the transmitters in the cars work on, but the radio station's transmitter must have been overdriven into distortion to produce 3rd harmonics that would coincide with the frequency band that many key fobs use. If you're going to run a pirate radio station onshore, it's a good idea not to do stuff that attracts attention -- like RF splatter...
 
Speed Daemon said:
LOL...OTOH I don't have any right-side door locks on either of my cars. Just the other day I went to open a locked door, only to realize that the door had no key slot.

Both my cars also have transponders in the ignition keys. I wonder if they were affected? I don't know what frequency the transmitters in the cars work on, but the radio station's transmitter must have been overdriven into distortion to produce 3rd harmonics that would coincide with the frequency band that many key fobs use. If you're going to run a pirate radio station onshore, it's a good idea not to do stuff that attracts attention -- like RF splatter...
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What kind of car do you drive? If its a Volkswagen, like mine, check underneath the door handle. My cap pops off and reveals a key hole.
 
Many vehicles these days only have a key hole on the driver's door. My Subaru's tailgate opens using an electronic latch release so if the battery is totally dead I can't get to my jumper cables.

I think the issue some of those people had was that their vehicles have the pushbutton start, that wouldn't work if the fob was jammed. There must be some override that's described in the manual, related to using a physical key that's hidden in the fob or provided with the car.
 
mplevy said:
I think the issue some of those people had was that their vehicles have the pushbutton start, that wouldn't work if the fob was jammed. There must be some override that's described in the manual, related to using a physical key that's hidden in the fob or provided with the car.
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I don't know which is worse: having the "fake race car" button, or fake "racers" who give up when the button doesn't work. Whatever happened to American ingenuity?
 
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