headlights

[Barry]

I have got to do some bodywork on a 7 fhc and the headlights will not pop up.

I have played around with the relays ect and I can't even wind them up by hand from underneath.

Am I missing something ( apart from a brain)?

 

Barry.

[morph]

There is a knurlled wheel on the underside of each motor unit which you must wind in the correct direction, (unhelpfully can't recall which way!). Have you tried this and found that they are jammed?

 

Morph

[sinc1964]

Just make sure that the plug is disconnected before you try and wind them, as they may kick back and give your wrist a nasty wrench if they suddenly begin to work while the lights are switched on.

Been there and done it too many times before !! ???

[Barry]

Thanks lads but I have tried all the above but when I turn one by hand it pops up and then flies back down,the other one can not be turned because there is too much resistance.

As a six man myself I will get it done by a seven owner with electrical experience and together we hope to get it working.

 

Barry.

[andrewt]

You need to disconnect them to turn by hand as the default position is down. if one doesn't move it is presumably seized. The one that cycles is working fine.

 

Andy.

[martynharrison]

There is a bit about the electrics and pictures of the one in the shed here that maybe will help to understand what can seize and why you need to disconnect the lights.

 

FAQ

 

If memory serves, colour code UP makes them rise, and UD makes them go down. With the lights turned off, UD should have +12v that will cause the motor to run until the interrupter disconnects the UD line from the actual motor. Just in case it is wiring, you could try disconnecting the connectors in the engine bay behind the four nuts that actually hold the lamp unit into the car. There are two, one does the lamp itself, the other is the control harness for the motor. To manually drive the motor, you would put +12 onto the UP or UD coloured wires, Blue with stripe is this? In one sense, it doesn't matter so long as you don't connect +12 to the earth on the black wire. When you power one wire, the lamp should rise as the motor runs until it is in the up position. Powering the other should make it run until it is in the down position.

 

This is why manually operating the lamp makes it go up and down, the UD wire is powered, as it should be, and therefore it is returning to the park position. Turning the lights on first and the reverse should happen, UD should be unpowered and UP instead will have +12v.

 

If it works fine this way, look for a wiring problem. If the lamp goes up and down endlessly, the interrupter inside the unit is stuck to the connector for up. If it doesn't go up at all, it's maybe seized. This is suggested on the faulty one as you should be able to wind it up manually when an electrical fault is creating a problem.

 

There's various joints that could help it to seize, I'd start by spritzing lots of WD40 and carb cleaner into the cavity, and if you have a set of sockets with more than just six flats, there is a size that suits the whorled knob underneath, allowing you to use considerably more force via a torque wrench to unseize it. Fixing the problem is basically replacing the whole lifting mechanism for a fiver - there are loads about because they don't go wrong and everyone has a spare pair in a shed. This will be the first actual failure I've seen, it's normally electrical or lack of use requiring them to be started manually a few times before they get back into working condition.

 

If the second light won't rise then there is some protection for this as I recall. Basically, you can't just put +12 onto UP on both sides when the second lamp is parked as then neither would park because each would keep powering the other and you would have to get a situation where both lamps happened to be parked at the same time. Therefore, there are diodes in each lamp that prevents current flowing back from lamp A to B and from lamp B to A, in both up and down situations. If the diode has ceased functioning - and usually it just blows, removing one of the functions either up or down on one side - then maybe the seized lamp is interfering with the working one.

 

Have a look through the pictures and see if this is all making sense. I'm starting to ramble on...

 

:laugh: