bentz69

i was having issues with the stock alarm. its a 96 2.8. basically i couldnt disarm it and the car wouldnt start.(i tried everything to turn it off) so i towed it to my stereo guy to see what he could do. he kinda tricked the alarm into thinking it was off when it really wasnt. just so i could drive the car. this is what happens now. if i activate the alarm, i cant deactivate it. i open the door with the key, the alarm goes off, and i hit this toggle switch that is grounded to the alarm ecu and the car, and it kills the alarm. heres the problem with the tranny now...

u know when u engage a gear(reverse, drive etc..) on the automatic, on the dash, a red box goes around the gear u are in. since i had this done to the alarm, all the letters have boxes around them. the car wont shift into 5th gear either. it stays in forth. now, when im doing lets say 50mph, and drop it into "3" or even "2", the car doesnt downshift. it stays like it was in forth gear. whats going on here? is this some safety feature or something?

Typist Formerly Known as (skene)

sounds like Multi-Function Switch.

bentz69

where is that switch located? is it as easy as putting in a new one? like a burnt fuse?

Typist Formerly Known as (skene)

IIRC... it is located on the transmission itself.

bentz69

http://www.vwparts.com/partlist.cfm?getpart=118549&PARTKEYWORDSEARCH= Multi%20Function%20Switc#part118549

Carol from Canada

You can read about it in your manual.

Probably some of the funky grounding done to the alarm system has messed up communications between the engine and tranny computers.