Switch under the glove box - whats it for?

[Dean250]

Any body know what the little switch under the glove box is actually for?

I think both of my williams have one.

I have a problem with the car alarm at the moment where it is functioning but keeps going off therefore I am having to switch the alarm on to drive the car then switch it off again under the bonnet to stop it from going off after 5mins, I am hoping this is some kind of parallel alarm switch?!

[Justin..]

It is to do with the alarm but what I don't know. I don't have the key for mine

[Dean250]

Hopefully disables it, will save me popping the bonnet all the time, I thought it might be alarm related as the same type of switch are in both of my cars but they don't look particularly factory design fit despite being neatly tucked away!

[northy]

It puts the orginal alarm into Valet mode to dissable to auto imobaliser arming at 15seconds from ignion off.

[Dean250]

Northy by original alarm you do mean the cobra one or is there two alarms? from some of the renault documents with the car it looks like the cobra one was fitted at a dealers or when imported, I need to look at the alarm to see whats causing it go off all the time

I think from a previous thread it's possibly got a battery fault and has leaked on the circuit board.

If the alarm is put into valet mode can it be left like that? will that enable me to just drive the car normally, it's a pain in the ass that auto immobiliser arming when the car is just used occasionally!

[northy]

yes the original Cobra alarm. It was fitted when the car was imported as you said. All it does is cancel the auto 15 second ignition immobilizer. If you have other faults then you might be lucky and can get them sorted out.

When mine started playing up i spent a fortune replacing things to try keep the originality of the alarm but in the end I had to replace with a new cobra.

[Dean250]

I will try the switch, it's only in the past 4 months the alarm has started playing up, I was working away, when I got home and went into the garage I realised that my maintenance charger had failed, the car battery had went flat and the alarm was very quietly chirping, I think this seen off the alarms internal battery.

I fitted a new battery to the car and started to switch the alarm on and off using the cobra key under the bonnet, but now the alarm goes off constantly when using the car normally, I know all of the door, bonnet and boot switches are working so it's something else, despite the alarm and immobiliser still functioning.

I know the cobra alarm when turned off using the key switch requires power cyclng twice upon switching back on but this never solved my issue!

where did you get the new cobra from? like for like replacement?

[northy]

was a full on replacement. Not something i wanted to do but in the end i had no choice.

There is a battery pack in the siren as you say and mine was badly corroded. I made a new one from Maplin that worked well. Not a hard job.

Remove the siren and a few screws and your in. If the batterys are corroded then replace them.

[Dean250]

Is the siren the unit under the bonnet that has the key switch in? will get this removed soon as I can't take the car anywhere right now!

[northy]

yes mate