2006 ford explorer door lock

Hello, I'm installing a Code Alarm CA680 remote starter into my 2006 Ford Explorer. Everything works great except the door locks. I connected my lock and unlock wires from the alarm to the vehicle- the problem is when i arm the alarm, the door locks will not energize with the first pulse from the alarm remote. It will take 2 or 3 lock pulses from the remote before the lock actuators engage. I tried this with the factory remote, and it engages the lock actuator every time i press the remote button- same with the lock buttons on the keypad. I have the correct wire, because after I press lock on the remote a few times, the system will engage the car's lock actuators- just not on the first pulse. but it will arm the system and tell me the doors are locked before the car actually locks the doors. I've tried all the programming features, which allow me to change the pulse length of the lock command- choices are 1 sec, 3.5 sec, and 30 sec, but nothing seems to solve the problem. Anyone have any ideas? Thanks!

I believe the programming feature is the length of time (duration) of the pulse and not how many pulses. I think your having a GEM wake up issue. You should see another pulse option, or maybe GEM wake up option.

What wires in the Explorer are you using? Should be: Green Code Alarm lock wire:   to pink / YELLOW Ford lock wire in driver's doorsill. Blue Code Alarm unlock wire:   to pink/green unlock wire in driver's doorsill. Anything about GEM wakeup is for people who are having trouble unlocking. It's only locking that you're having trouble with, right? And, the default 1-second lock/unlock pulses should be working fine.

This is an 06 Explorer- i have a service DVD i picked up on Ebay i've been using to verify the wire colors. The blue unlock is connected to violet/gray, and the green lock is connected to gray / YELLOW. I found in the owners manual how to disable the trim switch, which I think is what some refer to as the GEM Wakeup. I'm going to double check the output of the code alarm unit to make sure its putting out a good ground pulse to the lock wire. The problem seems to be only with the lock, not unlock- so hopefully its something simple. I'll work on it now and let you know what I find out. Thanks for the replies!

Hmm, those are the right wire colors according to the Audiovox information I have too. Sorry for saying pink / YELLOW and pink/green. Those were correct up to 2005, and for 2006, Ford freshened the Explorer a little bit, and changed some of the wire colors too. That "trim switch unlock" disable thingy is good information for you to have if you have trouble unlocking after the car rests for a while.............but it shouldn't make any difference on locking. I would try a few things: 1. Sounds like you know what you're doing, and that also you have the right wires, since it does work sometimes. But, do TEST the car's wires, and verify that you're indeed getting a ground on that PURPLE / gray wire when you hit the Lock button on the door panel. 2. Take a piece of scrap wire, connect one end to chassis ground. Momentarily touch the other end of the wire to the Ford's PURPLE / gray. If doing that locks the car 100% of the time, then you know there's nothing wrong with the car, so you can move on to it being either the alarm or the installation. 2A. That Code unit has what they call "flip-flop" lock outputs. That is, when you hit Lock on your remote, the green wire puts out a negative pulse, AND the blue wire puts out a positive pulse. It's possible that the positive pulse is getting the car confused. Temporarily, disconnect your blue unlock wire from the car completely, and try the Lock button on the remote again. If Lock now works 100%, then that was probably the problem. You can resolve that fairly easily by just putting a diode inline on BOTH the lock and unlock wires (just to be safe), and that'll prevent the car from "seeing" the positive pulses. You could choose to use two relays instead of diodes, but they cost more and require more labor. 2B. The Code unit puts out only a weak ground pulse. It should be strong enough to trigger the lock circuit in your car, but you never know. You could, if 2A fails to work, use a relay for a stronger output. The green from the Code unit would go to turn on the relay, and the relay would apply strong chassis ground to the Ford's wire. 2C. If both 2A and 2B fail, it could be a timing issue. It could be that the 1.0 second pulse from the Code unit doesn't make the car happy. You can buy pulse timer modules to decrease or increase the time. Maybe you need .75 seconds, for example. Again, the pulse timer would be a last resort. The more I think about this, the more I'm starting to think the diodes are going to work.

Hello, Thanks for your reply! I actually started doing some trouble shooting shortly after sending out my post. I have diodes installed already on both the lock and unlock wires from the CA Unit- I had read that if you didn't do this, the BCM would not go to sleep properly and would eventually drain the battery. I tried a scrap piece of wire connected to ground, and found that everytime i touch the lock wire in the vehicle, the door actuators do work properly 100%. I then tried disconnecting the green unlock wire and used a relay to test if it was a weak ground signal- I used a solid ground as the switched wire to the lock wire in the vehicle. I found that the CA was still not properly locking the vehicle. The relay would click every few pulses, not every pulse of the key fob. So next I disconnected the green wire and connected it to my DMM- I found that the CA unit was not consistently putting out a ground output with each press of the key fob. It probably put out the proper ground pulse 40% of the time. So I believe i've narrowed down the problem to the CA unit itself- I've contacted Code Alarm to see if I can send the module back to have it looked at and repaired under warranty. Thanks for the reply, hopefully a new module will solve this problem!

Wow, that's too bad. But at least it seems you have it figured out. If you don't want to send it out for warranty, there are two more little things you could try. 1. Make sure it's not just a faulty crimp on the doorlock harness that plugs into the alarm. That is, unplug the harness from the alarm, put your tester right onto the little pin coming from the alarm brain, and test there directly. Faulty crimps are pretty rare, but they do happen on occasion. 2. I install Pursuit, another Audiovox brand, but I'm almost sure your CA680 is the same thing anyway. There's another four-pin harness, with "pulse before start," "pulse after start," "pulse after shutdown," and "pulse during start." I forget the Code Alarm colors. Anyway, "pulse after start" also makes a pulse during Lock. You could try using that as your lock wire. In this case, the car will also lock every time it remote starts, which shouldn't be a big issue, as long as you know about it. If you want ignition controlled doorlocks (lock automatically when turning ignition on), the "pulse after start" won't work for that.