crazydemon

Hey everyone, I just have a quick question about the 5spd cobalt tranny.

I will be putting in a remote starter shortly, and Im wondering if the cobalt has sensors that tell the ECM what gear the car is in. I've seen it in some other manual cars, but I dont know if this one does. If it does, it would my the install a lot easier, as I can just use that information to tell me when the car is in neutral.

Anyway, if you have any information, please let me know, and thanks in advance.

Jack.

Jackalope

Ask Devon about this one! His cousin drove his car, left it in 1st and went in the house. The next day Devon went and hit the remote stat button and his Cobalt drove itself into thier big ass privacy fence ripped down a big chunk and tore up his front end pretty good.

crazydemon

That's exactly what Im trying to avoid

tdirlmeier

Yeah, theres no sensors in the Cobalt for that. I had mine installed professionally and I know they said the car will try to start even if it is in gear and you push the button. I actually had a close call with that too. My gf at the time hadn't driven a stick in a while and she had been doing fine, but one morning we went to leave and she didn't engage the clutch before she started it while it was in gear and the car nearly drove itself thru the back of my garage. Luckily she released the starter quick enuf and the ebrake was on so the car only moved about a foot. I told her that even if the remote start wasn't in there she still needs to disengage the clutch before starting. Needless to say, shes no longer my girlfriend and she never drove my car from that point forward. HAHA!

ptrblkz24

I was trying to find a wire that reads ground when the car is in gear but i couldnt find one.I didnt go crazy probing wires looking for it though.My friends 88 rx-7 has that wire.It makes it so much easier installing a remote start.What i did was put magnetic reed switches on the shifter so it reads ground when i leave it in gear.I connected it to the hood switch input of the alarm,so it doesnt start when in gear.Or you can just by a remote start designed for a manual.My alarm has that feature but its a pain in the ass activating it everytime you get out of the car.

bc3tech

every install i've ever heard of has a "safety switch" that you have to flip before the remote start will work. basically by flipping the switch you're saying "no, i didn't leave my car in gear, so it's safe to remote start"... flip the switch and put it in gear, then remote start, and well, you deserve it.

crazydemon

That's actually what I was thinking of doing if I didnt find the sensor wire.
I was looking at some photo sensors, but found nothing that would work so far. Could you point me at the sensor that you used in the install? I would appreciate that.

ptrblkz24

I used something similar to this:

The only difference between these and the ones i have in my car are my sensors are round,not square like those.I bought them at radio shack.I checked on there site but i couldnt find them.I dont know if they still sell them.I bought them years ago when i put the same setup in my cavalier.I just put the switches in yesterday,ill try to post some pics of it.

crazydemon

Cool...
The only difficulty I see in getting this setup to work is finding a reed switch / magnet pair that would trigger at the right distance when the shifter is moved from the neutral position.

ptrblkz24

Id say it triggers at maybe 1/4-1/2" distance.Maybe more,im not sure.Just take the sensor,ground it and get a volt meter and see the distance in which it triggers it.I have 2 sensors on the shifter.one at the first gear position and one at the reverse position.The way i have it setup,it triggers the sensor in everygear.