Sounds very scary, and I'm sorry to hear that you and your son had to go thru this.

What's at fault? Unfortunately, you are dealing with microprocessor control on a 14 year old vehicle. I wouldn't trust a desktop in my home to work reliably and consistently after 14 years of hard use. And that's in a relatively controlled environment. But we expect those same electronic components to still work perfectly when exposed to huge temp and humidity changes, vibration, corrosion, etc. As an engineer, I'd say they are well beyond their warranty!

Not minimizing your situation, but this is totally out of the control of Toyota or their suppliers given the age.

 

Remove the battery from the key fob for a bit, click the button, wait a bit, reinstall the battery and see if the buttons go back to normal. Not sure if this would do anything but it's a start.

 

To be clear, I’m not blaming Toyota. But it’s an issue that needs to be fixed because it could become dangerous again. Would the keyfob battery issue potentially cause problems with the buttons on the car as well? I suppose it’s possible if it’s in the vicinity?

 

I thought it was just the key fob. If the buttons in the car are acting "the same" as in weird, all that can be done is a lot of electrical diagnosis to determine what the issue is.

I'm not sure how your key fob is or if you have a physical key. I know on my moms 2013 Sienna she has the smart key fob but it also has a physical key inside of it (for emergencies I assume).

 

Understand, and I have no vested interest in defending Toyota. Just stating a position as an engineer and car guy.

Could it be the remote? Possible. But from the way you describe it, I'd be looking at the Body ECU. With each generation of vehicle you find less and less real point-to-point wiring. Everything uses local area networking. The master switch assembly on the drivers door sends a signal to the ECU, and that sends a signal to each door lock. The system glitched. You could try disconnecting the car battery, step on the brake (to discharge the system), and then re-initialize (typically cycling the locks with the door switch, and then with the fob should do it). It's like pulling the battery pack from your hung-up laptop to regain control. The most forceful of reboots!

 

It was the physical button on the driver’s door that was acting that way. I only pushed the key fob button once When I was getting into the car. It’s an old school one, just a little thing with a door open button and a lock button and unlock button, plus an alarm. The door open button doesn’t work though because our electric door went the way of all sienna sliding doors a few months ago. I will definitely try the battery reset.

 

I am by no means saying this could be your issue. But i had a dodge caliber once. The locks were going haywire. I replaced driver switch and everything. No change. I then tried putting new battery in key fob and right away noticed a difference. My issue was fixed. A 4 dollar battery solved issue. So i would have to agree with them try cheap first and change battery or put known good battery in key fob.


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Best solution so far. Unplug the battery for a minute or two (or longer) and plug it back in.

 

I should also mention i never even used key fob on the caliber mind you. And that was my issue was the battery in remote


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Could be a weak battery. Heat in the summer is awful on batteries, and if it's still OK but not 100% you can get wonky things like this. That's where I'd start. Headline is probably a bit overly sensational though. :|

 

Hey there H1012D,
Were you able to solve the door issue? Kindly post back as this makes the forum work. Thanks