Purchased a low mileage (60k) 06 Lucern CXL. Beautiful car but the one thing it doesn’t have is remote start. I live in WI and we love our remote starts on cold winter days. Any suggestions on adding it would be appreciated. Is it there and just needs to be activated ? Can I hook up the Buick system or should I go after-market ? Can I do it (I’m pretty mechanical) or is it a dealer or Technitian item ?
Most people would say it isn’t possible to add remote start to a Lucerne/other GM that wasn’t optioned with it; but I was actually able to figure it all out after months of researching to try and figure out how the hell to do it. No VCI code or anything needed.
First off, my Lucerne has the option code “AP9”, and as a 2007 Lucerne, that means it was the normal lock/unlock without remote start and without the extended range antenna. I’ve seen people say that you need option code “AP8” but that just isn’t true.
Since this is such an old post I’m going to go light on the details, but long story short I found a quirk in the way GM’s SPS2 programs new calibrations onto the BCM, which allows me to program another Lucerne’s BCM calibrations (one that has remote start) onto mine without it writing a new
VIN into it and without any trouble codes or issues.
If you were to do this, you will need a RCDLR from a vehicle with remote start, and you’ll need to ground out one of the pins in the BCM (so it thinks the hood is closed, because Lucernes without remote start didn’t have a hood latch that told you if the hood was open or not). And then you’ll also have to reprogram the theft deterrent module to the calibration that is labeled “vehicles with remote start” in SPS2.
If anyone is interested in this I could make a writeup with pictures for everyone as I’m sure atleast someone out there would find it useful.
