xpressalarm in 2000 corolla

I'm new to this forum so i hope I am posting in the right place. I am trying to install my first car alarm system. I have an Xpress DX370 alarm system. I have the following questions:

1) On the wiring diagram that came with the installation manual, there are two wires for the door locks. One is a light green which has a designated as "connect to(-) Lock & (+) Unlock" and another one light blue wire designated as "'connect to (-) unlock & (+) lock." from this website, I was able to see for the wiring diagram for the car that the door lock is a light blue/white (-) wire and door unlock is a blue / YELLOW (-) wire. Am I correct to connect the light green from the alarm to the light blue/white from the car and the light blue wire from the car the blue / YELLOW wire from the car? sorry i'm new.

2) on the car alarm there is a relay that i can connect for the low current wire to the car's starter selenoid. where is this low current wire on my corolla? color and location please...

thanks
CJ

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CJ

1) you are correct. The locks trigger with a negative pulse in your car.

2) If your alarm came with a starter kill relay it connects to the alarm. The starter wire at the ignition harness gets cut in half and you wire it thru the relay. There is no "low current" wire in your car. I am not familiar with your alarm and don't know colors...

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Mike M2
Tech Manager
CS Dealer Services

thanks for the reply. i will do the connection and hopefully this will work. cross my fingers. You know when i look at the alarm wire diagram connection for the door lock, it look strange when a wire is designated for example (-) unlock & (+) lock. is this means this wire will change polarity when i armed the car (to lock the door) to (+) and when I disarmed the car to (-) when I disarm? If so, this does not seem to happen (to reverse polarity) when i tried to read the output with my voltage meter. thx.

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CJ

It's a cheap and simple way of using low current "flip flop" devices instead of more expensive, lees problematical and more versatile internal relay driven devices. Yes they will provide both polarities but on European cars with lots of processor feedback I use diodes to "condition" them. i.e. 1N4004 in each wire with the diode bands towards the alarm, one of those diodes should be also mounted from 85 to 86 terminals of the starter cut relay if they provided you with one.
The instructions for that product sound like Chinglish...good luck.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

i have a 2000 toyota corolla. i've reviewed the wiring information i downloaded from this website. i'm going crazy as i can't find one single RED / white wire under the kick panel or near the fuse box that will trigger a ground when any of the doors are open. can someone please show me a pic where this one single RED / wire exists? i've spend two hours trying to isolate for this one wire. thx.


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CJ

9 times out of 10 the all door trigger wire will go to the domelight.  That wire will usually get to the domelight by traveling up the A pilllar of the vehicle.  That usually happens on the drivers side of the vehicle.  Look for the wires as high up as you can see.

I found the easiest spot on that car to be the drivers A pillar. You can reach up behind the fuse box to get it where it comes down from the A pillar but it's a tough reach....

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Mike M2
Tech Manager
CS Dealer Services

Thank you all for your replies. I am an amateur so please bear with me. What is an A pillar that you folks all talk about? Now suppose I do find this wire before the dome light will this work? The reason I say this is because on my corolla, the dome light by design will stay ON a few minutes after I close the door.

Thx and Aloha.

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CJ

This website describes a RED / white wire for the trunk trigger wire but there is no indication where I can find it. As with the door trigger wire (for all doors), where is this wire? Thx.

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CJ

Okay. i found out what is the "A" pillar. Also i found out that my trunk lock does not have a trigger wire so I had to install a pin switch. I finally were able to get the alarm to work without any problem. Thx all for your assistance.


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CJ

Do you have any of the following?
A light that comes on when you open the trunk?
An icon on your gauges to tell you the trunk is open?
If so the trunk trigger is on a microswitch on the lock behind the trim under it.
Or if the second case, the floor loom going up to the instrument panel.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

Please, you are expected to have SOME way of testing and finding out for yourself.
With most current Toyotas, when the door is locked the dome light shuts down so domelight delay and supervision aren't a problem.
ALL Toyotas except the original UK made Yaris for the European market have a trunk switch, always have.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

Please see my replies below in caps.

howie ll wrote:

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Do you have any of the following?
A light that comes on when you open the trunk? YES
An icon on your gauges to tell you the trunk is open? NO
If so the trunk trigger is on a microswitch on the lock behind the trim under it.
Or if the second case, the floor loom going up to the instrument panel.

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Here is the problem. I am a novice as I had claim earlier in my posting or suggest to it thereof. Too bad your reply came days after I posted my request for help to locate the trunk trigger wire. I did do some testing at 1) the wire harness that ran along the bottom side of the driver door side and 2) the wire harness in the trunk area. I was looking for a negative or ground output trigger wire whenever the trunk opened but i could not find one. the alarm input for the trunk is a negative....so since no one replied, i then proceeded to install a pin switch. all is done and nothing i can do about it now....main thing it works but now i know about some other exploration i can do (e.g. near the trunk latch) the next time.

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CJ

Yes sorry but I do have to work sometimes.All door trigger on Toyotas used to be RED / white with silver dots.
Make an assumption..if it has a trunk or hatch light that goes out, GOT to be a switch somewhere, the other place would have been at the lamp. Remove bulb and it's the wire that doesn't measure 12volts.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

The RED / White Door Trigger Wire for this Corolla is up behind the Fuse Box, up to the left of the Brake, way up in the corner. You may have to lay on the Driver's Floor Area with a torch to have a look up in there. It's up in there and stands out. It's one of the highest wires to reach, but it's there!

I've included a picture of this wire to help you out since I've been putting in an Alarm, Remote Starter & Keyless Entry into my Corolla which is the same year as yours. Only thing left for me is to find that Second Unlock (-) Wire, but that's another thread. In the meantime, everything else is pretty much working as I'd like, and I would like to help other's where I can as I know it can be very confusing, especially when the diagrams online are only vague and don't cover the needed details.
Took me hours to find that Door Trigger wire, but eventually I found it and it worked.

Here is the picture of where it is:
(In this picture the RED / White Wire looks Red, but the white is thin and behind most of the red, however if you look closely, some of the white can be seen on the bottom near the black insulation).


Hope this info helps.

As for the Trunk. There is a unique Trigger wire for that, though one of the easiest ways to find that is in the Trunk itself. That is located at the Latch itself. If you need a photo of where that Trigger is, let me know and I will take a photo and upload it for you. If you want to go up front for the wires, you will need to test for continuity from the Trigger in the Trunk itself. Easiest way is to run a wire from the Trigger in the Trunk, and run a wire through to the front. I recently ran a wire that way for Remote Trunk Release. Again, if you need a photo of where to run the wires, let me know and I can also post those.

I know my particular Corolla doesn't have an Electronic Trunk Release, rather is is released by a cable near the fuel release lever up near the driver's seat. So there is no wiring for that. For my Corolla, I recently installed an Solenoid and attached it to the Alarm which releases it remotely now.

As my bye-line says "Soldering is fun", however, in the case of that RED / White Door Trigger wire, hidden way up under the dash, I might consider using a Scotch-Lok connector myself.        Sorry, Howard.

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Soldering is fun!

Aaaargh..choking sounds and mutterings of blasphemy off stage. Kreg, pick it up in the "A" pillar or the dome light. Q.E.D
Of course on the UK ones, called Auris and what fool thought of that name to succeed the world's biggest selling car model! Talk about the soccer expression don't change a winning team*, before diverting on our models it's the only plug facing the glove box (behind it on the left hand side) with three wires, 12v+, ground and door switched ground.
*Not actually true any more, if you're in Europe you play so many games in a season you need 2 first teams. We're sending our kids team to Siberia (truth), we've already won that group and our first team has a big game 3 days later.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

kreg357 wrote:

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As my bye-line says "Soldering is fun", however, in the case of that RED / White Door Trigger wire, hidden way up under the dash, I might consider using a Scotch-Lok connector myself.        Sorry, Howard.

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Well, I was using the Scotchlocks at first, but found their connections are unreliable. They seemed to be easier at first, but soon after I found I was checking for continuity due to them not connecting well enough. Soldering I found is far more reliable and stronger. Though, this one particular wire for the Door Trigger is a pain to get to, and no fun with a Soldering Iron. I've now soldered all my wires except the wires for the doors. I'll be soldering them very soon. For the Trigger, not sure yet. I'll be trying to give that one wire a go.

Another soldering convert.       A small butane soldering pencil is great for those tight spots with thin gauge wires. 

BTW, great photo with excellent detail!

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Soldering is fun!

How do you get those great photos to this page, please pm me with your e-mail and I'll contact you for advice.
N.B. I wish the mods would merge these posts,I'm becoming schizophrenic.
One last point, I honestly DON'T believe this unit is going to work. If you look at the diagram in the other thread, left hand side, lower middle, it mentions starter cut then shows a coil and mentions ignition! Bloody Chinglish.
For safety reasons, DON'T cut the ignition.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

Could you possibly show a photo of your OBD ll socket, wire side, also known as data socket.

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.

Thanks for the comments about the photos. I know a picture can say a thousand words. They really help when needing the finer details and to where wires are etc.
I use a standard digital camera and use photobucket to host them and then embed them in with the text I type. Howie, I'll PM you my email and I can defiantly show you how I'm doing it.
Here is a picture I just took of the OBD II socket, wire side:

I have an OBD II Reader so that I can pull codes, but no codes have come up with the vehicle yet. But it's great for checking the sensors and other things on the vehicle to make sure they are running nicely.

I deliberately tried to avoid a China made device. I thought EZ-65 would be good, as the contact details provided were in Georgia, US. The business I bought the kit from is about 1.5 hours from here which I bought this online. It seems impossible to get products made anywhere else but China these days, and I know a lot of their products are cheaply made.
For the ignition wire, thankfully I never cut the ignition. The instructions I found are very vague. The only wire I've cut so far is the Starter Wire and put the Relay in between Starter Wire so that the Starter will cut out once the car is started with Remote Start. I ignored most of the Remote Starter and Relay wiring in the kit's instructions and got that information from a thread somewhere, off a fella who installed a similar kit in his Skyline. I also managed to learn how the Relays work and tried to make sure it was correct before wiring. Taken me nearly 2 weeks all up to instal this kit as I've checked over everything many times and compared to many threads for different models and kits. All that is required for the Remote Starter itself is wired, and so far it starts like a charm.

You don't unfortunately have tach on that plug.
The 2 rules of thumb are:
If the instructions are vague, don't touch it!
What sort of tech. back-up is there?

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Amateurs assume, don't test and have problems; pros test first. I am not a free install service.
Read the installation manual, do a search here or online for your vehicle wiring before posting.