[carbon bimmer]

hey guys so heres my issue. i bought a 2009 335i from a small dealership (worst mistake of my life) the car has 53k miles on it but it seems like theres no alarm coz it doesnt seem to arm when i lock the car. however the car is equipped with the motion detector inside as if it has an alarm. can the alarm possibly be off? is there a way to silence an alarm so that it doesnt arm when u lock the car?if so how can it be reversed?? what are your thoughts on this?

[Manny_World]

You can change the volume of your siren and toggle the chirp when the alarm is activated/deactiviated. Look on the DIY section under coding. I'm sure if you don't want to buy a cable or feel comfortable doing it yourself that someone local would for a beer or two.

[fdriller9]

How do you know the ultrasonic sensor is installed? Did you pull the center dome panel and see the sensor?

If the red clown nose under the rear view mirror doesn't blink when you lock your car, you don't have an alarm.

Alarms aren't standard on the 3 series.

[Aleksey]

Did not mean to highjack it, but don’t want to create one more thread on the alarm.
My question: local dealer quoted $630 for parts and installation of the alarm another quoted me $577 but they did not sound like they are sure about it… What do you guys think of the price?

[MPort13]

Not sure but with my car (2011 E90) the iDrive allows you to turn on/off the audible alarm (chirps) and even lets you turn on/off your daytime driving lights. If yours still won't let you, maybe you don't have an alarm installed.

[1QuikWS6]

Originally Posted by carbon bimmer

hey guys so heres my issue. i bought a 2009 335i from a small dealership (worst mistake of my life) the car has 53k miles on it but it seems like theres no alarm coz it doesnt seem to arm when i lock the car. however the car is equipped with the motion detector inside as if it has an alarm. can the alarm possibly be off? is there a way to silence an alarm so that it doesnt arm when u lock the car?if so how can it be reversed?? what are your thoughts on this?

If you have actually seen the US unit, but have no chirp/light flash upon lock/unlock; could be someone has turned these off thru iDrive or BC stalk on non-iDrive cars.

You should also have a flashing 'clown nose' under your rearview mirror upon alarm arming - although it is possible to have the chirp upon locking/unlocking and the blinking clown nose - but alarm not functional, if the alarm was not activated after install.

One way to test is to lock the car, then hold down the Trunk release button and see if the Panic Alarm sounds. This will at least let you know that the alarm is fully/properly installed and activated.

3 series did not come std with alarm. Thru certain years of the older cars they did have the alarm wiring harness present in the car though for an EZ alarm retrofit. The newer cars don't even have the wiring harness present

Did not mean to highjack it, but don’t want to create one more thread on the alarm.
My question: local dealer quoted $630 for parts and installation of the alarm another quoted me $577 but they did not sound like they are sure about it… What do you guys think of the price?

Alarm can be had from dealer on eBay for slightly over $200 (or even cheaper if you can find one FS on the forum).

Dealer activation is around $300 (at least at my area dealers) because most dealers cannot go in and individually code items. They have to reflash the entire car to add the alarm to the VO.

And then there is the install labor...

Better off to buy yourself from one of the above mentioned places, install yourself (not that hard at all if you have the wiring harness present - I know for certain that it was still present up to 2/2009 build date, which is what my car is & I added the alarm), buy a coding cable & activate the alarm yourself (+ the coding cable allows for activation of a ton of other nice features).

[Manny_World]

Originally Posted by Aleksey

Did not mean to highjack it, but don’t want to create one more thread on the alarm.
My question: local dealer quoted $630 for parts and installation of the alarm another quoted me $577 but they did not sound like they are sure about it… What do you guys think of the price?

Paid about $320 when I ordered mines. It came in the next day and was installed for about $300 more. Sounds about right.

S/N: I lost a lot of cool features that one of my coworkers programmed for me and it took FOREVER to program it .

[wrickem]

Clown nose blinking is the easiest way to tell, other than holding the panic button like others have said.


In my '07 (which was prewired from the factory), it cost me just a little over $400 (maybe $420 tops)to buy the unit from the dealer, have them install it and have the car coded. It seemed to be around the average price people on here were paying.

[Coding@DetailAddict]

$250 is about the price you can find it for new. We charge $80 to install and $80 to code.

Hope that helps give you a better idea of a fair price.

[Aleksey]

Thank you for replies guys! Dealer's price for parts is 180+tax, the rest is install and programming... since vehicle is under warranty I think I'll go thru dealer this time...