Aftermarket alarm troubles

[OUMike]

Okay. About two years ago or so I had Car Toys install an alarm on my truck. Was an Audiovox (forgot what model). Now whenever it is really hot outside and really bright the alarm will go off. Has anyone had troubles like this with Car Toys/Audiovox or alarms in general?

 

If the room is dark or I'm in covered parking the alarm works normally. Just seems to be super bright and hot conditions. Anyone??

[JimG]

Well in general heat can cause problems for electronics. Since you're from TX, I guess there's no chance of you being able to test this on a bright cold day. How's the alarm set up? Are there sensors everywhere? It's possible a sensor is bad only when heated up like this, causing an alarm condition. Other question, where is the "brain" of the unit mounted? If it's in the engine area, I'm sure it's getting mighty toasty. The PCM and other fancy electronics have big heatsinks on them to help prevent overheating. Most aftermarket accessories like this are in a black plastic box that does nothing to help dissapate the heat.

 

Different example: At work I'm troubleshooting a computer that can't connect to the network. After some work, it turns out to be a FOT (Fiber Optic Transceiver) which converts the CAT5 signal into fiber optic signals. It got too hot inside the unit, which is a little black box, and stopped working. Let it sit on my desk for a week and tried it again. It works perfectly, but only because it cooled down.

[OUMike]

Hmm very interesting. Thanks for the insight. My truck is black, and I believe the brain of the alarm is up under my dash. As far as sensors go I'm really not sure. I'll have to talk to with car toys about it.