So, I purchased a new/used 97 z28 from a guy cause I needed a new shell to put the remnants of my wrecked 96 SS into. Of course, I was quite the impatient dumbass about getting another ride going and did not check this car out enough. The guy has now disappeared and I'm left holding the bag. Hopefully I can correct the issues. At the very least, I am learning ALOT more about these cars now that I have to dig into all this shinannigans... Here's two of the issues I'm trying to solve:

1. key has no chip in it but works. I figured there was simply a resistor wired in but, after looking for it now, I cannot find a resistor. ha. The "security" light is on constantly while its running.

My plan for this : I'm planning on switching my steering column & BCM from my 96 SS over to this car and use my old key and keyless entry. Is this a legit idea to combat this issue? Will I need to switch anything else to make this idea work? Oh, I did already switch my computer into this car so that I can still use my tuning and logging software which I believe is locked to the PCM.

2. headlights are always on when key is in run position. I can turn head lights on with switch when the car is off but, they are on no matter what when it is in the run position. Highbeams and fog lights will not come on. When I hit the switch for highbeams, I dont even get the indicator in the dash saying that they are on.

My plan : I'm not done checking the easy stuff wiring wise for the head lamps. Worse case, I might be pulling off the front clip and checking all the wiring for head lamps. Not sure what else to look for. If I'm lucky, the high beams may just be a bad switch in the column and swapping columns might fix it. Fog lamps might be burnt out or busted bulbs, haven't checked that yet. Found that the switch wasn't even plugged in earlier but, even now that it is, they dont light.

Any advice on what else to check into is much appreciated. When I was swapping my motor and tranny over, I obviously spent some time under the car and realized that this guy had definitely hit something or ran over something because there were scrapes and dents in a few places. There's many more issues with this car than this stuff but, these are my focus right now.

 

Yeah that sucks I ran into the same problem when my 93 Formula got totaled and the engine was still good so I bought a 95 T/A frame and it had all types of problems...not to mention a rat ate through most of the body harness

 

You have to check everything in the headlight section of the wiring harness to see what could be wrong. Could be something the guy rigged up.

If you swap columns from your old car, you will also need to swap out the BCM. The BCM is what reads the resistance in the key. I hope this helps.

 

No. There is no reason to do that. A constantly on SECURITY light means that it is in fault enable mode. Meaning the VATS system sensed the correct pellet resistance before a fault in the system was found. So it determines that there is in fact a fault, and not someone stealing the car. Most likely it's the two small wires going to the ignition cylinder. So all you would need from your old steering column is the ignition cylinder. Then, simply have a new key cut for that cylinder with the resistance of the BCM in your 97.

No, you wouldn't. Just simply have a new key cut.

 

the resistance in the key needs to match the bcm right?

So if he uses the column and key from his SS with the BCM from his new shell, wont that cause an issue?

 

I think what he meant was to have a new key cut to match the cuts of the ignition cylinder in the column but using a blank with the resistor that matches the BCM.

 

Thats a picture of the key I was given when I bought the car. And the guy had no wireless remotes for it either. I just assumed the resistor trick was done but, there's no resistor wired in that I can find yet.

I was looking to avoid paying for new keys with a chip (x2), and new remote transmitters (x2) since I have all this from my old car. Plus, the highbeams dont seem to be switching on at all and the steering wheel in the new one looks a little ratty. My thought on switching steering columns and BCM was to address all these things at once and cheaply, since I have all the parts already from the wrecked 96.

I'm mainly just wondering if there's any other parts or wiring I need to switch from the 96 to make this work? I mean, the steering columns with the ignition tumbler and all are identical right? Just unplug and unbolt and thats it, right? BCM is up behind the passenger side airbag right? just unplug and unbolt and thats it right?

 

Yes, that's what I was saying.

And I already explained your issue to you with not needing a pellet in your key. Your SECURITY light is on. VATS is disabled. Read back through my post, or you can refer here:

http://shbox.com/1/pass_key.html

 

followed the link and this is last paragraph about abnormal operation:
"If the system detects a fault with the lock cylinder circuit after the engine is already running, the SECURITY lamp will light. The engine will be able to be restarted. This is called “fault enable mode”. (The system saw a good reading from the key at one point during a previous ignition cycle before the failure. So, it considers it a problem and not someone trying to steal the car.) When in fault enable mode, PASSKey protection is disabled until the problem is repaired. Once repaired, the SECURITY lamp will go out about 1 minute after the key is turned on."

So, something had to have faulted during normal operation WITH A CORRECT key pellet in this car's history and then for whatever reason the dude has a blank key made with no pellet to use from there on out? weird.