E30 Zone

Hey guys.

So my 318iS has been playing up recently. The battery was flat so jumped it and all good to go. Took it for a long drive, the next day I went to start it again and nothing.

The battery has charge as the lights turned on but the engine wouldn't crank. This made me think that the alternator might be bad, I cleaned the battery terminals and cables. Unfortunately the alt cable that goes to the battery was frayed so I changed it for a fresh one.

Repeated the jump process and again took it for a drive. Now when trying to start the car all the lights illuminate on the dash, the starter turns and weirdly the wipers limp across the screen.

The car is fitted with an aftermarket Scorpion alarm system and the light next to the stereo flashing when trying to start the car.

Is this the immobiliser interfereing and stopping it from starting?

After the battery went flat the central locking would not work using the scorpion fob so I just used the keys.

Anyone know if this is the issue or how to override/ reset the alarm?

I have searched on google previous to this but as they arnt a company anymore all I could find was remove the alarm which I don't particularly want to do!

Any help much appreciated! Sorry for long post.

Chris

The problem with an aftermarket alarm/immobilizer is that we don't know how and where it is connected into the car, and to what circuits, so it's difficult to advise.
Yes, the immobilizer could be stopping the car from starting, but there are also a couple of other things you mention, which, as yet, I've no idea on, especially the wipers' antics.
Check that the smaller wires that are attached to the battery + clamp are making good contact to the clamp, and if this doesn't improve things, connect a piece of wire from the + terminal of the battery to the + terminal of the ignition coil.

At this point I notice that your car is an iS, and doesn't have a single ignition coil with an exposed + terminal!!

Pull one of the three pin plugs off of the coil pack, identify pin 3 with the green wire, and push the wire from the battery into this pin, and try the car. It won't run properly of course, because it'll be one cylinder down, but you should be able to tell if the immobilizer was cutting off ignition power to the engine

Thankyou for the advice Brian. I will let you know how I get on.