To Lock or Not to Lock

[JohnFromPerth]

It has been suggested that even if you park your vehicle in a secure locked garage, you should lock it anyway.
The reason given is that if you lock the vehicle it shuts down the ECU as well as all the other microprocessors on the Canbuss. Otherwise, if the vehicle is left unlocked, everything is "live" awaiting your command when you return and draining current from the battery.

Locking the vehicle and shutting down everything saves battery current drain. This is important if you plan to leave the vehicle for some weeks. Otherwise you may come back to a flat battery.

I had a Kia Sorento in the past, and the handbook even suggested pulling a certain fuse in the fusebox if the vehicle was going to be stored for any length of time. Not sure what the fuse disabled, but it obviously cut current drain. Nothing like that suggested in the PS handbook.

[spot01]

The Gen 4 has a fuse that the factory & dealers pull to avoid battery drain when shipping & stored, but I'm unsure which one it is. I think most cars would have something similar.


Also worth noting, some insurance companies require the car to be locked whenever someone isn't with it, including when inside a locked garage (many garage locks & remotes aren't very secure) - worth checking you insurance PDS. Same applies to leaving the keys not adequately secured, eg, on the table inside the front house door, etc. Some insurance companies are getting very restrictive with their conditions these days.

[JohnFromPerth]

Anyone know if the PS has a fuse to pull if stored for a long time?

[BruceandBobbi]

Why not just disconnect the battery.

[JohnFromPerth]

Because you then lose all the radio pre-sets, mobile phone bluetooth settings, possibly the auto transmission learnt settings and anything else that is user programmable.