Shrinking the key fob (SE/SS)

I received two SE/SS remotes for my '04 (bought Oct '03), and thought they were too big. Accordingly, I mounted the key from one of them under the car, and cut down the electronic portion until it was about half the original overall bulk. It worked properly and was more convenient. The image was posted on the old Yahoo! group, which has apparently vaporized.

I just had an @$%!!! incident in which some items were lost - including that cut-down fob. Before I reduce the second one, I want to have a spare.

This time I want to do a far more aggressive and professional job, which I'll properly document. I think the SE/SS remote can be reduced to about 1/3 its original volume, and there's a good possibility that it can be made almost 2-dimensional, so it fits into a wallet like a credit card.

If anyone has a used SE/SS fob (accident, whatever) to sell, I'll gladly buy it - though I'd rather not pay the dealer's ransom. The key isn't necessary as I still have the one from the lost fob under my car.

And, I'll post the results with step-by-step data.

Henry

 

I wasn't aware of the danger and thank you for the good advice.

I'll give it a couple of days and will guard that remaining fob carefully. It's too big to lose easily....

 

That was no problem. I just made a simple shim that sits permanently in the slot - works fine.

The second generation will be similar.

 

You can buy inexpensive keychain dangles that do that.

If I reconfigure a Prius fob into a two-dimensional form, it might be simple to add the whistler - probably with a separate battery to protect the SE/SS function. The combined result will probably be smaller than the original Prius fob.