Out of blue, keyless entry with OEM fob quits working. It's not fob battery, I've replaced twice and verified with AutoZone remote RF checker which reports says fob is sending signal, so apparently truck is no longer listening. Tried the 'ol "reboot" process (disconnect battery, touch terminals, wait 10 min, etc) on off chance that would fix it, but no luck. I have no other odd behavior from any other electronics so this appears to be isolated to keyless entry. I was going to try reprogramming, but I only have 1 remote, and before anyone suggests the "ground pin 1 to pin 4" programming procedure that seems to crop up everywhere, I don't have a "pin 1", in my 2k3 Dakota, it's just an empty slot. Does anyone know what the receiver module is for the keyless entry and where is it located? Any ideas on further troubleshooting would be appreciated.

 

The receiver is part of the CTM.

It very well could be the fob. It's not just that it transmits but the code it sends.

A locksmith or dealer can help.

 

Dealer has capability to help, but not the willingness. They just wanted to replace ctm (with zero other symptoms) and sell me another fob to go with it. No deal. I ordered doorman fob and programmer below for way less than dealer wanted for the labor just to try to resync my current fob. Worst case I’ve isolated the issue to ctm far cheaper than dealer, best case I’m up and running again with new fob without paying dealer for programming. Will post back with results after it arrives.
https://www.dormanproducts.com/p-835...ter&origin=YMM

 

Also, this has nothing to do with the keyless entry issue, but "rebooting" my truck (unhook terminals, touch together, wait 15 min or so) turned out to be a great thing to try. Took a few miles for idle to stabilize, but it feels like I picked up 20hp and throttle response is way better than it was previous. Obviously not sure how long it will last as whatever happened for it to eventually "learn" it's way to the previous state will most likely happen again, but it's been a week or so and still pretty peppy. If you haven't done reset in a while, could be quick performance boost!

 

Here you go....

https://www.dormanproducts.com/p-835...ter&origin=YMM

 

LOL, a bit late, but I like where your heads at. Should show up today, here's hoping.

 

Just to follow up in case someone else hits this thread. Turns out there was nothing wrong with the truck OR the key fob, apparently they just got out of sync (something my local dealer assured me could _never_ happen when I brought it up). I received the Dorman fob/programmer linked above and they worked like a champ. Then with the working fob, I tried syncing up my original OE fob, and it worked! (so now I have two again).

tl;dr

• Truck and fob can become unsync'd somehow, not sure how, but it happened.
• If you don't have a working fob to resync from, you DO NOT need the dealer, https://www.dormanproducts.com/p-83507-99164.aspx?year=2003&make=Dodge&model=Dakota&partt ype=Keyless%2520Entry%2520Transmitter will get truck/new fob sync'd again.
• My local dealer sucks and will do nothing to actually troubleshoot an older vehicle (no big surprise)

 

Actually meant to copy that link to another thread and ended up posting it in the same thread I was copying from.