Immobiliser (?) issue

I went out for a short drive in my 550 this afternoon. My car started immediately, despite not having been driven for around 3 weeks - battery good and strong. After about five minutes, I stopped. When I came to start it again, less than a minute later, it was dead.

The RAC mechanic came along and tried all the obvious things, but to no avail. The battery was fine and he tested the fobs which were both working OK, but just not doing anything. The doors would not lock either and the little red light on the dashboard stayed off all the time.

Harvey, Carrs' (my local Ferrari agent) chief technician, dropped by to take a look (he was collecting a car from a customer nearby), but he couldn't get it to work either. As we were waiting for the tow truck to arrive, Harvey pressed the fob again (for the hundredth time this afternoon!) and there was a loud click as the doors locked. He put the key in the ignition, turned it, and the engine started!

Coincidentally, they have had a 456 in recently with the same problem: it wouldn't start for no obvious reason, but, equally mysteriously, an hour later it started just like normal.

I have left the car with Carrs for them to check it over, but it is always difficult to find the cause when a fault fixes itself. So I wondered whether any one else has had a similar problem, either with a 550 or a 456?

 

First, in answer to the last post, I do routinely carry my spare fob (I keep it in the car, so that if my first fob fails, I can open the car with the key and then use the spare fob to switch off the alarm) and that produced the same result. Also, the RAC man had a fob testing device and both fobs passed as working.

Now the solution. I picked the car up today. Carrs found a bad joint on the fuse panel which they tell me is a result of the ageing process affecting the fuse panel itself. That is now fixed, so I should not get that problem again. However, continued ageing is likely to result in further problems in the area of the fuse panel. As replacement fuse panels are no longer available, there is no way of preventing this and the best we can do is to add an inspection of the fuse panel to the annual service schedule to try to identify issues before they become problems. Not perfect, but the best under the circumstances.

 

No, in this case it was definitely down to a dodgy connection in the fuse panel. Sorry if I have caused any confusion.