Spanners

My Clifford 500 alarm went haywire again today - putting both indicators and the brake lights on permanently. This is the second time - the alarm only being fittted at the end of May and having been replaced in early July.

This time, armed with experience won by Ade I knew what to do. Stop. Pull out the alarm fuses. Wait. Put them back, triggering the alarm in the process, reset it and then away we go again.

But this is NOT good enough for a premium product.

I know Ade has the exact same problem three times and I think AmuseBoy too. Each of us has had a replacement control unit - so that is six control units, but clearly it is a "soft" problem as the unit recovers if you power it down for a while.

Who else has had this problem? This will be common to the Clifford 400, 500 and 600 which are all the same alarm unit, just with different sets of added features.

I wrote to the CEO of Directed Eectronics in the States who own Clifford (motto "Driven to Excel") about the problem, and about the poor customer service from Clifford (though excellent service from Premier alarms in Northampton that fitted it). He has not bothered to reply. I shall be writing again!

Be aware - Clifford alarms are not all they are cracked up to be. Not only does this unit fail, it fails in a way that is a danger to other motorists. You do not necessarily notice it has failed, yeat you are driving with the entire back end of your car lit up - very dangerous.

I am going to post this same message on the main Electronics forum also.

Amuse Boy

Xby - I haven't had any of the problems you are telling me nor the unit replaced or repaired in any way.

I've never had a false alarm nor has the system behaved strangely.

Touch wood.

I may have sent some confusing PMs when you were asking for advice. Sorry.

The only niggle I have is the driver's side window going up to the top and then coming down a quarter when using the 1 touch operation - I was made aware of this by the installer. Other than that no other problems.

A lot of my friends have the Clifford 300 and haven't had any problems either. Could it be the installer is doing something wrong?

jimbo69ny

I have a Clifford alarm as well and I love it. Granted I am an installer and I did the install my self FYI: an alarm is only as good as the install. If it is installed badly then you will only get mediocre performance. Take it to a reputable place and have it checked out. If you are absolutely sick of having issues or they cant fix it get a new one.

stingerbtry

I agree totally. I have used Clifford since I started driving and this is the first car that I haven't put one on (OEM Alarm w/ sensors). I have done all of my installs myself and have never had a single issue with any Clifford alarm. I would say that if you are doing it yourself and getting these ill results then take it to a reputable installer and if you had it "professionally" installed then take it somewhere else and have them do it right.

rworne

My Clifford on the Camry (an older Cyber 3 or 5) never had a problem aside from a slight sensitivity when in parking structures.

Every now and then, the remote would arm (but not disarm) the car. Quite irritating. The problem was determined to be a weak transmitter in the key fob due to oxidation of the battery terminals.

My only gripe is the chirp sequence is opposite of other car alarms: two chirps = arm, one chirp = disarm, three chirps = tripped.

Spanners

My alarm was installed by a Clifford agent - and was, IMHO, done well (I am an electronics engineer by background). In this case I doubt the problem is the install.

What happens is the control unit has a connection to each indicator light so it can "flash" as you arm and disarm. It also has a connection to the brake lights - to sense the application of the brake for the "Blackjack" feature. It seems to be capable of illuminating the brake lights - though I do not know why/when it does this. When it goes into "failure mode" all three outputs are at 12v - i.e. each indicator and both brake lights lit up. Irrespective of the state of the ignition or alarm. This is NOT a "short" outside of the control unit - I proved that the first time it failed, this is a fault condition inside the control unit. Cut the connections and the car is OK again.

But the fault is "soft" - if you depower the control unit and then repower - fault gone away.

If this were just my car I would say dodgy unit - change it - as indeed I did, but I am on my second unit - as is another forum member - this is my second fault like this - the other guy is on fault three. Both from the same installer - but then there is forum member three - now also on his second unit using a different installer. Clifford have modified the unit in his car - and so far it has been reliable.

I see two problems here - which I feel reflect badly on Clifford. Firstly the failure itself and secondly the failure resulting in a dangerous state for the lights. Failsafe is how I used to design systems. Often needed a few extra bits, and a few extra lines of code. Always needed more detailed testing. Failure Modes and Effects Analysis we used to call it. For an alarm, failing with the car immobile is sensible - it is an anti theft device after all. Failing in a way the driver does not notice immediately, but which puts the driver at risk is not, IMHO sensible. Drivers around you unable to tell if you are braking or signalling!

The alarm and immobiliser work fine even in the fault conditions.

What I really want to do is get inside the box to see what actually goes wrong.

I had MAJOR problems with Clifford's web site. The book that came with my alarm (Fitted at the end of May this year) says you download the ClifNet Wizard software from a specific URL www.clifford.com/wizard - the same URL they have used for a long time. Clifford changed the location a few weeks ago - just when I wanted the download. No redirection, no mention in the site index etc - just changed it. "Site not found". Not interested when I contacted them to tell them either.

The UK Clifford web site was faulty for several weeks - When you tried to access it you got asked for a password and user id to get in just to the home page - but you could not register anywhere. Sent an email back to the person I had been dealing with at Clifford UK- and got "Email Address not known". Told Clifford US and asked them to tell the UK - they replied - "Nothing to do with us - go talk to the UK".

My installer was excellent - I thought Clifford were too - but no longer. They certainly do not live up to "Driven to Excel" IMHO. Their CEO has not bothered (yet - and he has had a month) to write to me in response to the letter I sent to him setting out in some detail, my experiences. I would have replied if I had been in his office given the copies of the emails I sent him.

It may not sound it but I am a very easy person to please. My problem is once displeased I am very difficult to placate!

Spanners

Just back from a 2,200 mile trip including a small 10 car meet and a 30 car super meet. My alarm problem repeated itself five further times, twice withiin 20 minutes at one point. Plus a new problem. Stopped the car and got out. Could not lock it. Nor could I disarm the immobiliser. Might not have been such a problem had the car not been top down, and 20 miles from anywhere with no mobile phone coverage. Not the remote control unit as I could still open the boot (trunk). By sheer good luck my wife had her keys with her and her remote worked.





After my first batch of problems not just with the alarm but with the Clifford web site and the Wizard software, I wrote to the CEO of Clifford's parent in the USA. I had given up on a response, but out of the blue one arrived today.

I have to say Clifford are now taking my problems very seriously, at their top US management level! In fact their response is rather impressive. I am now waiting for the next step which should, I suspect, sort my problem.

Watch this space!

MacGyver

I installed a high-end cliffrd alarm system in my car and ran it successfully for nearly a year. When the next summer rolled around, I installed two more kits in fellow member's cars (Stee and Chris), again both worked flawlessly, except with the minor caveat of each of their remotes worked BOTH alarms (they lived in separate states, so no biggie).

A couple of months back my trunk popper stopped working, including the one in the center console. Several weeks later, so did Steve's. The solution? Steve was over at Chris' house, chris popped his still working trunk, and Steve's popped as well. Since then Steve's has worked flawlessly again.

This is definitely a software issue and one more notch in the Clifford ladder of failures. I used to think they were a great company and sang their praises, but after seeing several soft failures like these I'll look elsewhere for quality.

Oh, BTW, my popper STILL doesn't work, but I haven't taken the time yet to reset the system in the hopes that solves the problem.

jimbo69ny

Well I just installed a Clifford RS3 in a 2003. I did not hook up the remote starter part of the alarm and just did the rest. The problem is that when I went to test the valet operation it didn't work. Come to find out the unit got its IGN. Signal through the remote start relay pac which I didn't install. So I had to make an appointment with the guy to come back so I can make it work.
grrrr

S2KSuzuka

I have a clifford 8000 i have never had any problems. I was a car stereo installer for a long time. Most alarm issues are install related. it doesn't matter if the alarm cost 300 or 30 the install will make or break it. what is the power and ground connected to


Mitch