well topic says it all.. my key was stuck to a magnet, now car wont crank.. is it another problem all togather or did the magnet fu*k up my vats key?

 

A magnet will not hurt the key. The "chip" in the key is nothing more than a small resistor. It has a set resistance and is not affected by magnetism.

 

If your car wont crank its worth a shot to try a different key. Those resistors get worn over time (i think) and start to give a different resistance. Also the key(s) are sensitive to water...so dont get them wet!! Cant promise this will fix your car..but its a starting point. Good luck!

Dan

 

If the VATS system shuts you down, the security light will come on. Then you have to let it sit for 5 mins to reset.

 

Your key was stuck to a magnet? Where did you find a brass magnet? Most factory keys are nickel plated brass. Even most replacement keys are brass, except for some really cheap ones that are aliminum blanks. I doubt that anyone would bother to manufacture a VATS key blank and use aluminum or steel as the blank material.

 

As someone already stated the VATS key is simply a resistor. If it gets wet sometimes it will change the resistance and won't start until it dries out but a magnet has no effect on a piece of carbon and brass!
Also, keep those VATS keys clean.

 

i dont have a orignal GM key, but my key sticks to a magnet... *shrug*

i donno what its made out of, but i would assume steel since its magnetic.

 

The magnet may very well have jacked your key; those keys also contain a microchip that is programmed with binary data that the ECM can understand. If a sufficiently strong magnetic field is applied to this data, it will be scrambled and thus useless. The car will not crank.

This happened to me after I had a MRI (Magnetic Resonance Image) procedure and forgot to take my keys out of my pocket. The car ('92 Camaro RS at the time) fired right up before the MRI and wouldn't crank afterwards. I had a spare set of keys in the car - the spare fired the car right up without hesitation. The key that went through the MRI never started the car again, but the spare always worked and I never had any VATS work done.

My guess is that if you have a spare (or get a new key made) your car will fire right up.

Conclusion: A magnetic field <b>will</b> render these keys useless if it is strong enough. Just my $.02.


-Ray

 

And in conclusion you made yourself look like a TOTAL idiot by not reading the rest of replies in this post! LMAO !!


Bwhahahahaha!!! Talk about "talking out of your ***" !!

 

:sillylol: :sillylol: :sillylol: :sillylol:

Once again misinformation pervades the board!

 

just like to add..


1... there is no "microchip"

and a MRI has a strong enough magnetic field that it can pull a metal shaving THRU your head.. deff strounf enough that you dont want to fugg with it.

my only thought on that could be the magnetic field pulled at the thin wire traces between the resistor and the outside contacts of the key...


in anycase, there is no chip in there.

 

Congratulations to yourself and novass for proving yourselves as juvenile asses instead of offering some constructive correction. People like you make it difficult for newcomers to make statements and/or ask questions.

MrDude_1, thanks for not flaming (out loud, anyway) and giving <b>some</b> credence to parts of my statement; I appreciate that.


-Ray

 

Are the outer contacts steel and not copper? The outer contacts might've gotten magnetized, and "repelled" the contacts inside the ignition switch? Just another WAG on why the magnetized key might not work...? But I'd think those metal contacts on the outside of the resistor chip are too small to repel anything... so nevermind.

 

Well next time, knowing you're a "newcomer", maybe you should NOT give out FALSE information to the thousand of people that will probably read this post. What made us react this way is the way you so confidently stated it. Next time READ everything else in the post before you proceed to make yourself look like a dumbass. That's all I wanted to tell ya