I have a 90 LS400 and when I try to unlock the car from the driver's side it sets off the alarm. The key -still- opens the door, but it also sets the alarm off. I can open the car fine from the passenger side (same key) without having my car scream.

I called up my local lexus dealer and the price he's quoting to fix it is pretty horrible. He's saying that there is a good chance I'd have to replace a large portion of the onboard security. I'm thinking it's probably just a short in the door handle/keyway cylinder area but I'm not sure what to do.

If the security system was bad then it would do that on both doors, correct?

Anyone had similar problems and managed to rectify them without taking out a mortgage?

I haven't had much sucess in finding just the door handle cluster online or locally. At least at first glance it seems like it's made so that just the handle/cylinder can be removed from the door and replaced.

She's not a showcar, but she's in excellent shape for a 90 with 200k miles. This door handle problem is one of my major concerns right now since it's one of the very very few problems I need to fix on this car. The front bumper is showing some age as well, and I can understand with the florida sun and bugs, but that will have to wait a while.

http://www.joseph.shackspace.com/christine1.jpg (about 600k)

my (rather drab) LS400. There are some superb looking cars on this board. One day mine will be among them (but first, mechanical and electrical things to fix, and then asthetics )

 

i had the same problem once, but it dosent sound as bad. on my car the drivers side lock would set off the alram if i turned it alot, so i had to do soft turns untill all doors unlock without the alarm going off. i believe my problem was that the key hole was kinda jammed. what i did was spray so wd-40 in it a bit and it got it a little more loose and better. over time it went back to normal. hope that helps

 

Thanks. I will certainly give that a try, as a 2 dollar can of lubricant is much better than the price I was quoted

I'm going to be monkeying around with the speakers in the doors this weekend, so I was going to see if I could manage to find some way to repair/replace it while I had the door panels off.

Thanks again!

Joe