those that may remember, will know that I was working on my right headlight motor b-4 I started on the suspension.

i replaced the gear with a metal one, from 007DOUG. once i got it all back together, and plugged it into the relay, it wound up... with the switch off. the motor would get hot, and i would hear a "poping" sound.

thinking it was the switch, i ordered a new one from Rodney. that was 2 months ago.

well, tonight i installed the new switch. When i plugged it up, the darned thing wound right up... with the lights off!!

and yes, it made a popping sound.

so, what do you think? bad relay? i swapped the relay with the left light, and it did the same thing. so what's wrong?

thanks in advance!

hoop

So, is this a '84 thru '86 car?
If it is, sounds like it could be the internal switch inside the motor itself. Could it be that it was installed upside down?
It may behave this way as it is a torque operated switch and if it's upside down won't work correctly and will end up burning up the motor.
Might try turning it 180 degrees from where it is now.

If it runs opposite you have the magnet in it reversed. In my instructions that is not in there. Some one else did them. I have to redo them someday and add that and a few other things. The click may be the contacts. They click when they hit the high/low limits.

NO MORE HEADLITE MOTOR PROBLEMS FOR ME !
Ive spent last 3 days customizing my 308 Ferrari kit with GT 40 style headlites. Used late model Chevy van headlite bulbs for low beam, Ion round driving for high beam, flush clear lexan covers. Looks hi-tech and works great. Ill have pics as soon as there done. Rodney, you may be interested in these for a kit. I have all the patterns i used for various pieces. Everythings fabricated from aluminum plate and angle-so nothing will even ever rust!

this is in my 86 GT.

as far as reversing any magnets... all i did, when i rebuilt it, was replace the gear. i don't recall removing anything else.

wait a minute... i did pull the magnet off of the coil, to clean everything with electric motor cleaner! however, wouldn't the magnet be the same, no matter which way you install it? i didn't dissasemble the magnet.

i replaced the internal brush and contact assembly... where is the "switch"?

as for the isolator relay, wouldn't that send power equally to both headlights? i can't see it sending power to one side and not the other.

the "pop" has to be the switch cutting itself off and on.

does anyone have a pic of the intenal switch?

thanks!
hoop

If you dig around you can get all the parts to upgrade the motors to the Gen2 setup. I've seen the Gen2 setup on the sunbirds with the little half door over the lights. It's a bit of a pain to dig all the wires out of the sunbird but it's no big deal to reconnect to the Fiero. I spent a bunch of time looking over cars in the salvage yards to verify this. One or 2 people around here have already actually done it. I'm going to write it up after I finally get time to rip out a spare set. I already have the Gen2 in my 87 but I want the spare parts.

I wonder how many people would be interested in a kit version of this upgrade. I was thinking of pulling a couple sets and preping them to be a dropin. If anyone is interested I'll look into seeing what it would cost.

[This message has been edited by theogre (edited 12-12-2000).]

hoop,

You and I are just on the same page here recently. I ordered the aluminum gears from Chris _____ (can't remember his last name) last spring. Installed them a few months ago. When my motors would power up or down, they would hit the stops so hard that the motor could not reverse itself. It was mechanically binding. I ordered a set of Rodneys gears, and everything now works fine. I realize that this does not directly contribute to your problem, but if you do solve the switch/popping you could still have the problem that I just described.

Hope this helps... someone,

William T. Thorn, III