Does anyone know anything about chips in car keys these days?

My kid someone lost the chip in the key to his 2006 Honda so he is on the spare key as the chipless key won't start the car any more. He says he knows nothing about the key fob opening up but the screw was loose and I looked in the key fob and the chip is gone.  

I know the easy solution is go to the dealer and spend $350 for a new key fob but I'm sure there is a simple and inexpensive way to fix this as the key blade is fine and the buttons still open the doors.  I looked on-line and the chips are only $3ish but a new chip means programming the car to recognize the chip.

I saw that there are actually programmable chips in the $5 range where using a device like the "Handy Baby", you can read the chip in the good key then program the new chip to be a duplicate of the other key.

Anyone have any experience in this area?

Find a locksmith that does cars. A 06 Honda shouldn't cost that much.  You could buy a key off Ebay & then program yourself. I think you need at least 1 working key for this. Google your car & instructions.

When he bought the car, it only came with one key so I found a mobile locksmith who came out and made duplicate keys for it.  The guy had what looked like a mini mill in his van that he used to cut the keys.

Honda wanted $350ish for a key with the door buttons (which included programming).  The guy who came out wanted $99 for that but made a deal on the 2nd for half price.

Once the keys were cut, he hooked up some tablet thing to the ODB port to program the keys.

Here just the chip is missing.  I saw that I can buy a chip locally for $2.50 but I would still need the car programmed.  I also saw that for $5 I can get a programable chip and with a device I can read the chip from the other key then program the new chip to give off the same code (as opposed to programming the car to accept the new chip).

I figured that it is cheaper to just get a new chip and program the car or preferably, just clone the chip.  The device to copy the chips is about $100 and if I have to drop about $100 anyway, I'd just as soon get the chip programmer because you never know what that might come in handy.

Plus, I suspect that the hardware involved in programming the chip is pretty simple and I've already made a chip reader for a microcontroller project, I bet I can just add to my software to program the new chip, if I had some technical details about it.

While I doubt I'm gonna get lucky and find someone local with more details on car ignition chips but anyone familiar with those chip details?

Couple ways to handle this.
1. Buy a new key blank and have it cut. Read up on how to program the new key to the car. (google "programming 2006 honda key for instructions)
2. Pull cover off of steering column, tape or zip tie working key right above the lock cylinder and reassemble column. Cut a chipless version of the original key and use it. The car will read the code from the zip tied key and allow the non chip key to work.

At least this is how we did it years ago.

some locksmiths can do it,  triple a platinum will refund for this.


its about half the dealer cost. I bought the fob on amazon and paid once.    sadly twice I had to pay the stealership.  its about $450 from them...


or like the other said bypass it