ItsRotary7

I need to buy a alarm for my vert. What does everyone suggest. I want to have it operate the door locks.

jmseven

As a fellow vert driver...I would like to know. When I had bought my vert, it had a cheap Viper alarm....I yanked it, due to the fact that I hate their quality.

I am and will by a Derranger as soon as the $$$ is available.

I would like to hear of other comments on this subject.

Thanks for opening it!

shadyteke

i'd recommend the apline sec-8063 or any of the alpine alarms. I have one on my 7 and my girlfriend has one on her vw cabrio which as u know is a convertable also. U can buy an optional radar sensor from alpine which will detect anything around your vehical and trip if anything is inside it. I have her's set so if you even stick your hand through the window it sets the alarm off. Its great when u want to let the top down. There are alot of other nice alarms out there. They all offer some sort of radar. Viper, dei which i think is part of viper, crime gaurd, all are excellent alarms. Just price around and find one that suits ur budget

Gimpdiggity

Viper alarms?? BAD QUALITY??? Get real man.

DEI's (Viper, Sidewinder, Python) alarms have been and will be one of the best alarms that you can get. They have tons of options, and they work better than most other alarms out there that are twice their price.

And if you ever do have a problem with a DEI alarm, they have a lifetime waranty on it, so that it just gets replaced with a comparable current model.

I used to sell Viper stuff at Circuit City, and in the two years that I worked there we had 2 Viper alarms come back that had just gone bad on their own. Of course there were several others that had gone bad because people messed with them or tried to install other components in the car and fried the unit, but guess what, even those idiots got a free replacement.

You can get a Viper alarm with a proximity sensor. My boss at Circuit had that on his Jeep Wrangler. When he turned up the proximity sensor, you couldn't walk within 10 feet of his Jeep without it setting off it's warning signals. And if you actually got up to the point where you were looking inside, the alarm would go off.

Ask anybody who's big time into car audio, and they'll tell you that the Viper stuff is the best.

jmseven

I work with PCB and semi here in San Jose.

I have seen there parts.....not so good. Like I said, look at a Derranger alarm and compare the quality.....

I have had the Derranger alarms in the past and they are like an OEM product.

DEI....looks like an RCA.

my $.02

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

I went with Code Alarm.

For keyless entry you'll need another 2nd gen door lock actuator and there is none stock in the drivers door. Passenger side is available from wrecking yards. Easy re-bending of mounting bracket and then remounting it on the opposite side of the actuator body (screw holes already there), and it will bolt right in. Although I wouldn't advise, you can alternatively mount an aftermarket actuator in the drivers door.

Code has a momentary trigger for the actuators already built in. Also, interior light goes on when you unarm it which is a nice plus.

Side benefit. Once you set it up for keyless entry, you can arm the factory alarm (after arming the Code Alarm to back it up) by simply opening then closing the trunk. Then, if someone uses a black box that finds the frequency to disarm your Code Alarm, when the door locks unlock the factory alarm is triggered.

Also, I suggest you get an area sensor so it will protect your interior if you leave it parked with the top down. Additional bad guy protection.

NJDave

FYI . . . DEI also makes OEM alarms for some cars.

Regarding my after-market alarm, I have an 89 convertible with a Viper 800ESP in it. Just about all options, except the pager. I have multiple, redundant starter/fuel kill switches, some connected to the alarm and some independent - the independent switches are very well hidden - the key is to make it hidden, but accessible, so it's not obvious you are flipping a switch when you get out of or into the car. I have the dual zone proximity sensor that gives a warning when someone gets too close to the car. The alarm is tripped if someone sticks their hand in the car (great for top down). I've got a glass break sensor and a tilt sensor (in case someone wants to tow the car) as well as a shock sensor. I have battery backups for both the horn and the alarm brain. And the stock alarm is tied into the system.

So far, I'm impressed with the system. The proximity sensor's a bit too sensitive right now, but I'm taking it back to my installer to have him tweak it.

One thing to note if you're considering an alarm is that, even with systems with many features, your car will still be stolen if a thief wants it bad enough. Just pull up a flat bed and tow it away. Sure the alarm will be going off, but all they have to do is tow it a short distance to a relatively secluded spot so they have time to disable the alarm.

My goal was just to deter thieves - the longer they think it will take to steal a car, the less likely they are to try.

Dave

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

Although not quite as sophisticated as Daves, my set up is with the same goal in mind. Make my car a pain in the *** to steal.

If they disarm the aftermarket alarm setting off the factory alarm, that should chase 99% of the thieves away. Just the flashing lights should chase away 75% of them all by itself.

But, if that remaining 1% REALLY wants your car, not much you can do about it. But, lets face it. Our 7's aren't $100,000 Porches. So, any alarm deterant should be enough.

Icemark

Jim seven,

The company (VSE) that build derringer has been gone out of biz for quite a few years now.

The market determined that their alarms were not up to snuff.

Maybe a couple of the engineers are still building them in their garage, but from personal experience installing hundreds of them, they had poor reliability and intermittent range issues. Perhaps it was all the improper sized board traces on the made in mexico alarms.

I would not recommend them in anyway.

Perhaps the DEI alarm you got was the $200 installed special, and was not installed correctly. Installed correctly they and the Japanese built (not the Korean and Chinese ones) Alpine alarms are the most reliable alarms in the world.

BTW DEI provides OEM to several car manufactures including the largest in the world GM. GM would not have dropped Code Alarm as a supplier if they had the same quality, met GM standards (frankly only Toyota has a tougher OEM standard, and they often use the Alps built Alpine based alarms), and had as few failures.

HOZZMANRX7

iTrader: (43)

Dang dude. I always look forward to your posts. Obvious insite we all benefit from. Keep them coming.

takerwolf

I'm getting the Viper 500ESP with a mercury switch in the hood and maybe in the back, the glass breaking sensor, the higly visible indiglo warning logo, power door actuators that hook up to it ($35 a piece), hatch release solenoid, battery backup, range extending antenna, the pager system with 1 mile range, and a pain inducing interior siren (probably the best option for the price $20). Got the alarm and logo+mercury switch for hood installed the other day and getting the power door locks tomorrow. The other stuff is on order. I'll post how it turns out.