KISS and Car Windows

[ghurd]

Wife's car.  A/C quit long ago.  Summer is here.

And the power windows stopped working.

She believes working windows are important.

Check the fuses, relay and breakers.  Not easy in itself.

Next is the master switch.

Seemed like a good idea to disassemble it.  It was NOT a good idea.

I did manage to get it back together.

Next is the dreaded wiring harness.

About now is when the car officially looked like a junk yard exploded.

Never counted how many wires were in that rubber boot between the car and the door.

Guessing at least 26.

I did count both, as in 2, of the wires which were not broken or with broken insulation.

Hard enough to change a fuse down there.

Imagine soldering.

Many solder joints, heat shrink pieces, and blisters later, the windows work!

And the power locks, remote mirrors, power locks, power lock stuff in the key hole, and  speaker all work.

Too late to reassemble the car last night.

This morning I can't find the keys.  Must have left them in the car?

And in the ignition.  Turned on.

Car is reassembled.  Battery charger is charging (grid).  Keys are safely in my pocket.

How many wires does it take to make that stuff work???

Evidently this many, plus a few smaller wires that dive out the back.

G-

[Bruce S]

With ALL those kinks in the wires, yikes!!

Bruce S

[ghurd]

The kinks are where the insulation was broken!

They certainly kinked a lot more during the processes involved in getting them to where they were for repair (and pic).

They would have been flexing at the insulation breaks.  Copper couldn't have lasted much longer.

Best guess is 5 or 7 were completely broken.

Like changing dash bulbs in a MB.  LOL

G-

[spinningmagnets]

Cars...(need I say more?)

I have worked on many old cars. I once bought a 1964 Ford truck for $500 as a work vehicle. After limping it home, I had a good look under the dash to evaluate concerns. It was a rats nest that I believe had been repaired and "improved" by someone who was blind and drunk. I was suprised it hadn't burst into flames by then.

I bought a big container of male/female connectors and several rolls of the fattest wire I would need (various applications, can be fatter than needed, but not too small for the other job or it overheats) in several colors. Ripped everything out, started from scratch. I even put a 3rd-eye brake light into the tail-gate.

I like electric door locks a lot. Lock or unlock all doors with one switch. Since they are solenoid-operated, I can still operate the locks manually if the fuse, switch, solenoid, or wires go bad.

Electric windows...I hate them, if they go out its a nightmare. Your post brought back many memories, so, time for a drink...

[Bruce S]

:-p

While doing maintanence on the scooter, I happened to look at the wiring diagram just because I could. SCARY too, wires going both ways under my seat.

I bought a split wire loom and shoved everything in it.

Wife now happy traveler?

Bruce S

 

[ghurd]

Wife's been driving "The Beast" for 3 days.  A real 4-Runner, not those little things they make now.

Some muttering about 45 miles each way, business meetings, dress clothes,

and screw the MPG... "The Beast" A/C works.

Just got the last stray parts replaced a little while ago.

Threw away the extra parts...?  LOL

Set 2 personal records.

Every wire had a piece of heat shrink Before it was soldered,

and

No stray parts left over and no places missing parts.

Maybe she will go back with the MPG tomorrow?

G-

[wooferhound]

Good job there !!

My response to the wife would have been more along the lines of...

"I'm sorry honey, but there are some things that I can't fix"

I wanted to see the picture of the finished product including an electric tape ball as big as a baseball.

[zap]

"Every wire had a piece of heat shrink Before it was soldered"

Way to go... that heat shrink usually doesn't work too well when you have to split it. I know from experience!LOL

I also have problems remembering to put the insulating boot on the wire before soldering alligator clips when repairing or building jumpers.  DOH!

I'll bet you're feeling good now eh G-?

[electrondady1]

it's mostly the pressure of time that makes these jobs so miserable.

i remember striping the entire wiring harness from a 78 Honda civic in one piece !

and installing it in a 55 international panel truck.

strangely enough  i enjoyed the process!!

(but i had forever to do it)

it still works.!

gurd you need to take a ride in that car .

 crank the ac, and put on the stereo .

 

[ghurd]

Her response to that response would be "I need a new car.  Today."

(she really would)

This one is barely broke in with only 240,000 miles.

Used thin-wall heat shrink.  Pulled 1/3rd of the wires one way, 1/3rd the other way, left 1/3rd in the same place.  Taped the ends.

Then had to wiggle them back so all the ends reached where they started.

Then had to wiggle that boot from completely inside the drivers door back to partially in the door and partially in the car.

They size that boot pretty close.

Not sure how long it'll take my fingernails to grow back.

G-

[ghurd]

No A/C.  Compressor, etc, is shot.

Nice stereo though!

G

[Bruce S]

If she gets out the "bike" and gives you that "LOOK" head for the hills!!

I'm with Woof, I was hoping to see a b-ball sized tape glob :-)

BUT seeing how well the G-controller can get things down to a small size, this eazy.

2. points for getting everything back in place
   
2. points for no left over parts
   
50. points for no blood left on the wiring after pulling it out of the door panel
    

[Madscientist267]

I knew this had to be good when I saw the title and author on the same line... LOL

Let's see...

Finding the problem without doing irreparable damage to the car: $0

Putting it all back together, having it work, without any leftovers: $0

A happy wife that isn't making you sleep with the dog: Priceless

There's some things money can't buy, for everything else, there's incentives.

LMAO

Good job dude

Steve

[richhagen]

How long of a warranty did you give the wife on the repair job?  I had a Jeep Cherokee once that I had to weld the door hinges back on every few months.  It was tough to weld to thin material and it made the sheet metal brittle.  I never took the effort to brace it.  I'm thinking your wiring might be a bit brittle where solder/flux soaked in, and where it was kinked before.  Hope it lasts another 240K miles though.  Rich

[dnix71]

That wiring mess is unfortunately common. I have a friend who had a Buick that would quit at a stop as soon as he put his foot on the brakes. Using the handbrake caused no trouble. When I unplugged the brake light switch the car didn't stall.

You all know what that means. Soemwhere the brake light wire was touching the fuel pump wire. Touch the brake, the fuel quits pumping.

Sounds easy enough to fix, except that even the dealer's electrical manual doesn't show how the wires are physically routed through the vehicle, just which color wire connects to which device. It took an electrical specialist mechanic 30 days in his spare time to follow the brake wire back through the car until somewhere under a rocker panel it was found pinched against the fuel pump 12v feed.

[Tritium]

"Every wire had a piece of heat shrink Before it was soldered"

I have heard this legend before but have never known anybody that claimed to achieved it.

Thurmond

[zeusmorg]

 I've always thought having wiring that flexes in a door joint is stupid at best,

why do you need an electric window on the driver's side anyway? passenger and rear, i can see, you can't reach them.. but a lot of those door switches could be located on the dash, or console.so, basically a door only needs two wires, for the door lock!

 I've repaired a LOT of those harnesses, the ideal way is to use silicone insulated fine braided copper wire.

Of course what I've usually done is just to use small crimp connectors and to replace the section going through the hinge/flex area. I've never had that repair not outlast the car, considering most of those repairs are already 80,000 Mi +, and how much longer is the car going to last anyway? I definitely do not like having soldered joints in the area that flexes, but you can usually pull excess through so it isn't.

 I think the WORST offender on door switches/wire breaking I've worked on is jeeps.

 I've ALSO always though it was stupid to put the fuse panel in the damn driver's side foot well! Why not in a sealed box under the hood? most German cars do that as well as several Japanese cars.

 We've just become a nation of consumers that expect all the little niceties, and I'd say most cars suffer the effects of minor breakdowns in all this feature laden crap way before the effective end of life of the car!

[jaskiainen]

Hi Glen!

I've been there too a few times

And I share your pain with numb fingertips.

But... There's nothing better than satisfied wife!

I also prefer using silicone insulated wires (like zeusmorg) everywhere there is mechanical stresses. Just like doorhinges.

Normal wire just works well if You live somewhere that temperature stays always

on the warm side. Freezing air usually stiffs the wire insulation and it

will never come flexible again.

I just drove my car to fill up A/C system a few weeks ago.

Everything went well untill it didn't start again.

So I went back to fill it again (I suspected a leakage) but nothing wrong.

I had to drive back to home and take my multimeter and start to measure.

What did I found? The magnetic switch had a coil broken. A new one is ~150€.

I did some googling and found that it's the most common problen in my car.

Someone told that he had 2 burned coils in one year. OUTCH!

I just started wondering if the coil resistance is 4 ohms, would it help

to make it last better if I put one 0.5-1.0 ohm resistor in series with it?

I know it lowers the pulling power from magnetic switch, but if it would make

it last "forever" it might be worth of trying? What you think?

Regards jaskiainen

[mdntdncr]

 I've ALSO always though it was stupid to put the fuse panel in the damn driver's side foot well! Why not in a sealed box under the hood? most German cars do that as well as several Japanese cars.

  Apparently, they're trying to do it slowly.  In our Intrepid, they have a fuse panel

in the well and under the hood.  And in my Envoy, it's under the hood and under

the driver's side rear seat  :S what the . . .?

[Colaman]

Put a large (guessing - 10,000 uF) capacitor in parallel with your resistor. The initial brief current through the capacitor as it charges should be enough to make the clutch engage, the current through the resistor should then be able to hold the clutch in fine.

Or something like that, anyway :-)

[Capt Slog]

I once had to do some chemical analysis of car window circuit boards to try to find out why they were going faulty.

What was happening with these boards was that the windows would suddenly start acting on their own, usually when it was damp , and once in a car-wash :-)

It was something to do with the flux for the tinning (if I remember correctly) that and the varnish.  They thought at first it was simple conduction through the water layer. Later they found that hen the board became damp there were enough salts left over to make the surface an electrolytic cell and the copper tracks would dissolve and then regrow as whiskers causing shorts.  It was possible to watch this growth under a microscope.  I never found out how they solved it or if they had to redesign the board to make the offending tracks further away from each other.

Not relevent to Ghurds problem I realise, but it's worth bearing in mind when you have to put circuit boards under damp conditions.

.

[spinningmagnets]

When I was young and my back was able to withstand this, I recall twisting upside down with a yiny "penlight" in my mouth. I was trying to see if one of the glass tube fuses had fried, and if yes, I pried it out with a tiny bent screw-driver.

I am convinced the car manufacturers did this to save $2 worth of wire. On the '64 truck I rewired, I made a wooden box that attached under the dash that had spring-shut doors. Inside was a new generic fuse panel that accepted the new Blade-style fuses that are colored.

The worst was an intermittent short. Sometimes the battery would run down, and sometimes it wouldn't. Turned out to be a wire passing through the firewall, the rubber grommet had rotted away and the worn part of the wires insulation would allow the copper to touch the metal body "sometimes".

Anger, frustration, depression...auto electrical repair be thy name.

[ghurd]

This is a 96 Camry.

This version has at least 5 fuse boxes, but there are at least 4 versions.

Under the hood (2), drives foot, passengers foot (hour of screwing around to check and it contains only 1 fuse and 1 fusible link), and one up inside the dash above the steering column behind an A/C duct.

About every internet site says the fuse is in a different box.

I drove a car that had the master switch in the center console.  Can't remember what brand it was.

My friends Honda has the body hole 5" higher than the door hole.  Looks like the wires will "twist" like in a windmill tower, instead of "kink" in the same spot.  That sounds like a good idea.

Common problem for these wires to break at that spot.

Why don't they have a 16" harness with connectors on both ends, like in a computer?  At least for the drives door.

If the wires break, change a $20 harness in an hour.

These replies bring back a lot of memories.

Door falling completely off a 6 month old Jeep Comanche.

Stereo fault causing the 200W max volume of Kurt Cobain, that couldn't be shut off even with the key, CD refused to eject, causing me to lay on I-80 frantically pulling random fuses in the dark.

etc etc etc

G-

[Airstream]

I was once toyed with by a smoke alarm that would false while someone took a warm shower, nothing compares to buck naked & dropping wet trying to silence one. It took an application of clear coat spray paint on PCB reverse to stop the false alarms.

On the harness those insulation breaks look like Joe Somewhen technician (no insult to real techs intended) got easy access while troubleshooting and when finished just slid the insulation back to cover the copper and then time & heat cycles pulled it away to expose the bare copper. I detest techs that brown nose managers with super-human quick task times, all they do is shift the work onto those who follow AND the worst cases usually get promoted to management!

[ghurd]

This was factory.  240,000 miles is a lot of door action.

It was heat shrinked on the fuse block end of the boot, with heat shrink that could not go over the connector.

It was taped to a tab down inside the door where a roll of tape would never fit, making me think it must have been taped in BEFORE the door skin was installed.

And there were some foam tubes glued here and there, which are not removable or replaceable.

I made a sensitive circuit for horse drawn vehicles.

The wire's insulation would absorb enough moisture to conduct a little and trigger the circuit.

Took a long time to figure that one out.

G-

[Norm]

I had a 54 Ford one time...starter problems ...

couldn't figure it out...so I traded it in for

another used car....dealer fixed the problem and

sold it to a guy....he drove it for about a week

bragging how good it was....then one day stopped

at an intersection out in the country ....turned

the corner and the whole frame busted in the middle

and collapsed to the ground!

Lucky ??

[ghurd]

A 54 Ford is 55 years old!

Gotta expect a little rust.  

G-

[Stonebrain]

Anyone tried to find a car WITHOUT ac,electric windows,fancy electronics etc,(something you can call "KISS"),but not to old,

I did.

I can say,those cars don't exist anymore!!!

Or if they exist I guess they must be more expensive then "ordinary" cars.

I don't mind if the carmakers all go bankrupt.

cheers,

stonebrain

[Bruce S]

62' Impala tudor 283/2-speed powerglide come to mind. Paid $100, replaced 2-speed with 350 turbo and sold for $2000.

Still had AM radio 5 speaker which included the 5th one in the metal middle.

Could fit 4.5 adults in the trunk.

Ahh memory lane!!

Headed to drive-in now

Cheers!

Bruce S

[ghurd]

More bad memories?

Buddy bought a 64 GTO.

Power windows.

Guess what did Not work and who had to fix them???

Geeze.  That was 30 years ago.

Thanks Bruce...  Now I just feel old.

G-

[Bruce S]

Naw, that's not old!! You can still do the work!!

BUT those were the days:-D

Working on a 49 Ford f100 with enough room on both sides of the 6 that had 3 on the tree is old.....

Now where did I put that Geritol?

Bruce S

[ghurd]

I had a 2-door hard top 57 Chevy.

Sold it BEFORE it could get historical plates.

Hamstrings are still sore from soldering.  Nobody ever said that in the history of the world.

I have some Geritol.  Remind me again, what is if for?

G-

[Stonebrain]

Oh! My 1960 or so deux chevaux(= 2 hp).

max speed 100km

air cooled boxermotor(like the beetle).

Managed to drive for a year or so without startermotor.

Allways park on a slope.

And in case of necessity,you could allways start it with a handcrank.

Those were the days..

cheers,

stonebrain