Alarm for Surf

[Stuart Lampard]

Hello,

Can anyone recomend a good car alarm, that they have on their Surf?
I would like one with a perimeter warning and maybe a pager.

Thanks, Stuart.

[si tate]

I have a toad CAT1 alarm & imobilizer, good alarm with full closure & insurance approved.

[BUSHWHACKER]

http://www.dynamicsounds.co.uk/viper...em-p-9691.html

[gary-r]

doberman - large vareity

[dieselboy]

I now have a Clifford / Avital system on mine. However having owned two previous cheaper Magicar systems I actually would recommend them over this for these reasons:

- Easy to check within signal range of vehicle for paging
- greater vehicle range (better in built up areas!)
- keyfob illuminates when it receives a page, the Avital does not
- The magicar has what seems like a delayed permiter zone where someone would have to be beside the vehicle for a second or so before paging. This is better as someone simply walking past would not set it off, but someone trying to jiggle a key in the lock would.
- the magicar has a ring function, if you park in a place which might cause someone an issue you can put a note in the windscreen "knock on screen to page owner" etc and the keyfob will ring like a phone when someone knocks the screen. Also handy if you have lost your keys like I did once and found them in the bin.

The only real benefits of the Avital I have found is that the siren is very loud and the keyfob uses encrypted keys between the keyfob and the car. The keys change on every key press and there is a system in place to prevent the keys becoming invalid if you press the buttons on the keyfob but they do not reach the car. The down side to this is I think the decreased signal range.

Apart from that they are practically the same system. I also added a tilt sensor on mine to detect when it's being or been jacked up. I tested this with my current Avital and I managed to get one of the wheels a mm off the ground very very slowly and gently before the alarm just sounded and paged. I'm not sure if the magicar has this.

Hope this has been informative!

[J i m s t e r]

I paid £500+ for a Clifford on my Golf GTI about 10 years back.

Worst.
Alarm.
Evarrr.

Everything would block the signal from the fob to the car, meaning the RAC were frequently having to tow me out of the range of any masts. Alarm would go off at random on the motorway. Swaying branches nearby would trigger proximity screech. Installers got solder burns on my floor mats and denied it. I'd avoid Clifford like the plague now.

I had to get a CAT1 installed on the Surf for insurance purposes and a place called SecureACar on ebay did the best price. It's a Toad Sterling 1. No closure, you can pay extra for this, but not a big thing for me, it's always cold so never have the windows down. They came and fitted it at work for £169 IIRC. Comes with the proper certificate.

Matey has got an all-singing, remote-start paging affair (Falcon Predator) on his Shogun Sport for the same money but it's not Thatcham approved, so would not satisfy my insurers - I guess his don't need to see a certificate. Thatcham have a list here of the currently approved alarm systems:

http://www.thatcham.org/security/index.jsp?page=75

HTH.

[dieselboy]

Everything would block the signal from the fob to the car, meaning the RAC were frequently having to tow me out of the range of any masts. Alarm would go off at random on the motorway. Swaying branches nearby would trigger proximity screech.
I've read on the internet about the alarm going off randomly on the motorway. Not even sure how thats possible but I've seen other people comment on that as well.
Installers got solder burns on my floor mats and denied it.

I'd avoid Clifford like the plague now.

I think the quality of the alarm is partly a result of the quality and knowledge of the installer. Things like solder burns are just not on. And the premature proximity triggering should have been due to it being set too sensitive.. Although mine is needing further adjustment / fine tuning which wont be at any cost for this but it's just an inconvenience.

The Magicar system was a fit and forget. Worked 100% of the time and didn't need any adjustment after the initial install. If it went off you knew someone was looking through the window at what was inside. Magicar are cheap. £60 - £80 for the kit plus installation. Because of this price the general idea is that they are not very good, however my experience with them is that they are better than the current Clifford (Avital).

Avital bought out Clifford some years ago.