2000 legacy alarm light stays on - alarm not working

[arbee524]

The alarm light in my 2000 legacy stays on solid, not blinking and the alarm doesn't work. Keyless entry does work. I tried setting valet mode on an off but no change. According to this link, http://www.cars101.com/subaru/keyless.html#alpine, I have an alpine alarm (the remote in the picture matches mine). However the alarm light is not in the center of the dash, it's on the very left side of the dash, to the left of the CRUISE button. I checked the fuse diagram, but it didn't indicate any fuse for the alarm. Any one have any ideas or suggestions.

 

Thanks

Ron

[four-fleet-feet]

I presume you tried everything in the article, including reprogramming your remotes?

 

Get in the underdash and check out the wiring to the alarm. Maybe one of the wires or the ground came loose. If you have a shock sensor, check it out as well. One loose wire or corroded connection can disable the alarm, but the keyless will still work. If the light's on steady it's telling you there's a fault in the system. You could always disable the alarm altogether to get rid of the light, but... why? It's probably a simple crimp (or loose solder).

 

Call around to local aftermarket shops which specialize in alarm and high-end sound systems (Ixnay on Circuit City and the like! They are so clueless ) for their cost to troubleshoot if you come up snake-eyes. Maybe you can get some free info over the phone (after all, they won't be selling you a new system, or some pumped-up sound, so they might tell you what you want to know to save themselves the trouble of a cheap repair). Just make sure they sell Alpines. Of course, if you have a nice relationship with a Subaru dealer, they might also tell you what to look for, or even fix it free. I've had that happen. Call your local dealer and see!

 

As long as the key fobs work it's not the fob batteries (which some shops will tell you).