Hi everyone!

So, I tried searching the forum, but either I failed on the right keywords, or this hasn't been posted about before. I intend to contact the dealership, as River's a Certified Pre-Owned and it's pretty likely whatever the problem is will be covered, but as it's Sunday and the service department's not opened, I figured it couldn't hurt to see if anyone here had any ideas.

I've got an '09 Sport without nav, so she's got the remote built into her key. Today while washing her, I found her doors unlocked... which was odd, I've got the habit of hitting the remote and locking her up when I walk away, even usually double tap the button so she meeps at me to tell me she's locked. When I finished washing her, I tried to lock her up using the remote, and it didn't work. I locked her physically with the key, which worked fine, and headed inside to grab my spare key and tried the remote lock again. No luck, and the spare key was brand new when I got River, at least according to the sales critter at the dealership.

What's really weird, is that she'll unlock with the key, but won't lock. Having tried the remote in both keys, I very highly doubt it's the battery in the keys, especially since one is supposed to be new... though I have a battery tester around somewhere, I may triple check that anyways.

tl;dr: the remote will not lock, but will unlock, the car; one remote should be brand new and both are fuctioning the same.

Any ideas?

 

sounds like the car thinks a door is open. The remote lock doesn't work if the door is open as a safety to keep you from locking your keys in the car.

 

I was about to come back and say that she mysteriously fixed herself... but after reading your post, malraux, I realized that's what it was.

When I'd given up on trouble shooting, being unsure what else to look for, I locked her with the key in the lock... then noticed the back driver side door wasn't completely latched. I'd pushed it closed the rest of the way, and didn't think anything of it. In the midst of finding this problem, I'd gotten distracted from the final step of my cleaning: the wheels. So I came back to finish that later. It required moving the car somewhere that I wasn't likely to get run over while stooped over on the road side of the car... so when I finished, I tried the remote lock again, and it worked.

Thank you for providing the explanation that solved this mystery!

 

Didn't the "door ajar" warning light work?

 

I hadn't turned on the car in the process of troubleshooting, and honestly I hadn't even looked at the dash to see if that comes on while the car's off.