Koufax

For the benefit of those, like me, who have close to zero experience working on cars, I will relate my experience this weekend installing the LMC5.

I bought the LMC5 before I bought my C5. I was sure that I would get a manual C5, and was convinced by the posts here that this modification was necessary. After I bought my car though, doubts crept in. My car was 10 years old, had been through the GM recall, and had never (to my knowledge) had a problem with the antitheft mechanism. I began more and more to believe in the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” philosophy.

Nonetheless, I was unsure as to which was the lesser of two evils - upsetting the equilibrium of my wonderful vehicle or risking a lockout at an inconvenient time and place. I had read about the excellent customer support for this product, and so I pulled the device out of my drawer about 10 days ago and started reading the directions.

For the most part, they were extremely detailed and well illustrated, giving me confidence that I could do the job. However, two doubts remained. The first was a doubt about the wisdom of fiddling with the car’s central nervous system to fix a problem that had never surfaced. The second was uncertainty about step #1 in the process, the one step that came with no further instructions or illustrations: Disconnect the battery. I had not disconnected a car battery in 40 years, and was sure that things had changed, and through my ignorance of this simplest of procedures I could be electrocuted or at least fry the car’s innards.

Nonetheless, on Saturday at about 4PM EDT, I opened the hood of my car (feeling very proud that I could manage that) and looked at the battery, LMC5 instructions in hand. I froze. When my panic subsided, I saw the black plastic cap with a minus sign on it. “That’s the one.” I said to myself. Now what? Gingerly, I opened the cap and removed the head from the bolt inside. What remained was a wrapped copper wire that was exposed at the end and encased in a housing the likes of which I had never seen. “How to take this apart?” I wondered. After gaping at it for a few minutes, I wondered further it the whole shebang could simply lift off. It did. Golly I felt smart.

So then I crawled under the passenger side of the dash and started to disassemble everything. I was pretty good at taking out the box and disconnecting it from the plastic housings that the wires led to. They were more stubborn than I expected, but I worked things free OK.

Which let me to the task of removing that first orange wire. It would not budge. Many tries later, I moved on to the purple wire. It gave way like a $10 hooker. Back to the orange wire. A virgin, unwilling to yield. I tugged, pushed, prodded, prayed and swore. Nothing worked. Finally, the wire broke off.

Stuck inside the plastic housing was the metal end that somehow had to come out. But now there was no wire to pull on and there seemed to be no way to exert any force on it. I began to imagine having to tow the car to a mechanic and having him completely rebuilt the wiring that led to this box. Suicide seemed preferable. At that moment, I dearly regretted having started on this project. I had had a bad feeling about this from the beginning. Why hadn't I heeded that voice of caution?

That let to my first call to customer support. To my astonishment, at 3:30PM (PDT) on Saturday afternoon of Memorial Day weekend, Richard was there. He could not have been nicer. After some discussion and attempts to get the danged thing out, we decided that I needed to run off an buy a very narrow set of needle nose pliers. I did. I came back and tried them. No go.

So I called Richard again. He was very patient with me, but it was now 5PM his time, 8PM my time. I was working by flashlight at this point in 90 degree heat. What fun!

After trying several techniques, one of Richard’s suggestions worked and the deformed, hideous, evil metal end came out. I let Richard go at that point and managed to complete the rest of the job with little fuss.

Then came the moment of truth: Reconnect the battery and start the car up. It was music. The engine started up fine, the display giving me the odometer reading as though nothing had happened. Only the clock, now 4+ hours behind the time, was a clue that something had happened.

So this job, which absent a defective wire would have taken Richard 15minutes and would have taken me 90 minutes, had taken 4+ hours. Am I glad I did it? I suppose. Richard and his product could not be better. And the gremlin that I feared the most – something asleep in the car’s computer coming alive to haunt me to my death – did not happen. Nonetheless, a faulty wire cost me more than 2 hours and lots of aggravation.

I pass this tale on so that those like me, who are not used to working on cars, can take stock of what they are getting into and budget their time adequately for the unexpected. And if there is one other moral of the story, it is to do the work when Richard is in his office. Without him, I would never have completed the job.

Jeff T.

Great story!!! I had a small issue when I installed mine and Richard emailed me on a Sunday morning. I had it corrected quickly.

Great part, even greater Customer Service!!

66dts-v

I had a number of issues (all mine from trying to rush) and Richard was awesome not only in the help he provided, but in not making me feel dumb.

stu12dozen

Goodonyamate! Thank you for posting a most entertaining story. You should feel very proud of yourself for completing the installation, even though it took a bit longer than anticipated. Treat yourself to a cold one!

Stu

bjones7131

Good for U, persistance paid off. These vette creatures are a pain to work on. I did mine about 2 months ago and all went well but for a 64 yr old wallering around in the footwell was not confortable at all.

RCFC5

I installed my LMC5 a couple weeks ago on my 98 and the only thing I would change is the tool (allen wrench) they give you to pop out the connectors is to small, I used one of my own and the wires all came right out

Vetteman Jack

Great story and glad you were able to get the LMC5 installed. IMO, you definitely did the right thing installing it.

CalF

Good story,just one question,where are you finding 10 dollar hookers?

laurent_zo6

Thanks for the story.
So how did you get the broken wire out in case it happens to someone else?

Koufax

If you look into the housing from the same end where you insert the Allen wrench, you can see a very thin piece of metal at one side of the hole. If you can lodge a tool (in my case a very small screwdriver) firmly against that metal and push on it, you may be able to push the whole shebang out the other end. Richard was asking me to bend it a little to get a better angle to push against, but I'm not sure I actually did that. I think I just pushed on it straight away and out it came.

camburger

This amusing tail of whoa is an often to familiar one for many guys who delve into some "simple" modification. They discover simple really meant simple for those 140lb soccer playing adolescence who could have probably done a shock install at the same time...not those of us who populate the "needs a nap" end of the demographic.

Everyone says it was a piece of cake, but when the poor soul who doesn't spend everyday up to his armpits in tools tries to do the job...well you know the rest..

My ribs were sore for a week after laying on that door sill as I LMC5'd my way to column lock freedom. But in the end there was a smile on my weary face...

tazor

Richard is great, we are very fortunate to have a electronic engineer who found the correct fix that gm ignored ,,,, kudos to Richard! Koufax show some confidence. we could do anything we want to do you proved it by starting with disconnecting the battery!

Phanni

I suspect that (secretly), Richard is becoming more sure that C-5 owners are all passengers on the short bus of life. (I own two)

laurent_zo6

Thanks for the info.

ZigZag

Great write up and funny also. (for me anyway) I have been holding back on doing this and had purchased the LMC5 months ago. When I touch things like this that are electronics it usually turns into a can of worms.

You've helped but not enough for me to give it a go quite yet. I'm not that far away if you feel like a road trip. You know two clueless heads are better than one.

Jeffspieg

I have had my car for several years now. It is a 2004 manual transmission. The other day the message came up on my dash that said SERVICE COLUMN LOCK. There was very little information in the manual so I called the dealer. They advised me to have the car towed in. Since I am like you and have no mechanical experience I was hesitant to buy that LMC five and install it myself. I have driven the car to the dealer and it is now there being repaired. But thanks to your tale, I will now order the LMC five and put it in. Thank you so much for giving me the confidence that I can do this.

ggroller

LOL

That was a fun read. Thanks for sharing.

If there is one thing I have learned over the years. it is to NEVER underestimate even the simplest of jobs.