Homelink red vs. amber

[CampoCougar]

My '95 Seville has the Homelink with the red lamp. Nothing I could do would program my garage door opener, because of the "rolling code" garage door openers these days. After researching, I have found that GM vehicles '97 and under have the Homelink red lamp system which worked with the non rolling code garage openers.  Beginning in 1998 mode year,  Homelink then switched to the amber light system, which means they are equipped to program the rolling code garage door openers of today. Off to the junk yard I went today. Got really lucky, found a '99 Deville, and removed the Homelink transmitter, needing only a phillips screw drivers and wire snip pliers.  The harness is NOT interchangeable between the red and amber systems. You must take the harness plug with it (just snip the two wires a few inches away from the transmitter). I did a bench test first before I installed into the car to make sure it was going to work (just connected a 9v battery for the power), and it worked. It installs in the standard bracket with just a little patience, and cut the old harness plug off the harness, and crimped in the new one, cleared it, programmed it to the controller remote, and it now works !!!! Long story short: if you have a '97 or earlier car, and a newer garage door opener, throw away the red lamp Homelink and install the amber light unit.

[Bruce Nunnally]

Nice job; glad you got it sorted out.

[rockfangd]

This has me thinking.

Both of my 97s will not program to my garage door opener.

I thought they were amber though. (I installed them)

I have never found one that had a different plug. I have a spare as well. Thank you for posting this. I wish you had a picture of the 2 plugs to see the difference.

If I ever get back to it I will post back here.

 

[CampoCougar]

5 hours ago, rockfangd said:

This has me thinking.

Both of my 97s will not program to my garage door opener.

I thought they were amber though. (I installed them)

I have never found one that had a different plug. I have a spare as well. Thank you for posting this. I wish you had a picture of the 2 plugs to see the difference.

If I ever get back to it I will post back here.

 

Play it safe. Go to a junkyard and take one out of '98 or later. If you already installed the amber units, but did not use their plug, then that could be the problem with them not programming. The amber light units have a three trace plug and circuit board connector, the red light unit have two trace; not interchangeble. I already installed the unit, so I may have a hard time taking a picture of the new plug, but I can take pic of the old plug. They are both two wire plugs. The red light uni ('97 and older) unit has an orange wire and black wire. The amber light unit has an orange wire and a blue /white wire.  Crimp the orange to orange, and the black to the blue/white. The picture shows the two and three trace units, that why you need the plug also when making this changeover to a '98 and later unit.

Edited January 27, 2020 by CampoCougar
corrected lines

[rockfangd]

I will be going at this again maybe next week. I will see what color the indicator is, and if I have to pull the units. I am surprised I don't recall there being a difference in the plug. MAybe I have not pulled a newer one yet.

By chance what brand opener do you have? and how did you pair to the Homelink.

My 2 regular door openers pair fine, I just cant get my new Genie one to pair with rolling code

I did verify both have amber lamps and both work fine with regular opener. Maybe I am just not doing it right for the rolling code type

[rockfangd]

To update this I finally got one of my Homelink to program to my Genie opener.

First opener remote had to be put into train mode.

Hold any button other than the open/close button for 10 seconds until red/green come on solid.

Push same button twice until light turns red.

Now here is where I was goofing up. Push the open/close button and the homelink you want to program

Hold both until the homelink light flashes fast. The remote code is now programmed to the car.

You now have to program the Homelink to the opener.

Hold Program button on Genie opener for 2 seconds. Will be flashing blue, once you let go purple should be flashing.

Go back to Homelink and push the programmed button for 2 seconds, release, and repeat.

Complete.

I was goofing up because I was trying to program the wrong button on the opener remote rather than the open/close button.

Now although this worked fine on my Deville I cannot get it to work on my Seville. (Both have the same Homelink)