trevmust

I'm super lucky. There is a store here that sells conversion housings.

RedVertTA

iTrader: (9)

Not sure I understand what your problem is but I'll bite.

The shaft is keyed with a rectanglish shape. Turn the **** on top of the headlight motor to turn the shaft manually until it fits into the slot on the arm.

Longcut13

1995 Formula, Headlights move up and down without issue. They do not make any extra noises. BUT THEY DO NOT STAY DOWN!!!! I turn them on and they come up, I shut them off and they go down and come back up. It is driving me nuts . Any ideas?

Longcut13

Really?............

RedVertTA

iTrader: (9)

Guys I've been having a reoccurring issue and I can't identify the cause. Please give me your .02

My car is a 2000, I have aluminum headlight motor gears, the motor covers are well secured in place with epoxy and also held with pressure from 3 washers integrated with motor mounting bolts. The aluminum gears were installed with a generous amount of marine grease and the 2 bearings on the top of the headlight are regularly oiled. Everything on my headlights is stock except for the aluminum gears.

Whenever my headlights popped up the drivers side one seemed to jump about a 1/4 of an inch further than the one on the other side and then come back down to where it was supposed to stop. The headlights did open and close in a synchronized fashion.

This went on for a while and I tried to ignore it but then the headlight refused to come up. It seemed that the white plastic sleeve that goes over the stopper for the arm came off. I inspected it and noticed it had several deep cuts in it, it was really torn up. The sleeve on the other side does not have this, they are both the original sleeves from the headlight assembly so the wear on each should be about the same. I also noticed that the steel stopper arm on the bracket was badly bent, so much so that the stopper would not make contact with the arm. I bent the stopper back into its position, reinstalled the white plastic sleeve and reassembled everything. The headlight worked but still did that jumping motion when popping up.

The headlight lasted about 2 months and then the same thing happened. When I had reassembled everything 2 months earlier I inverted the plastic sleeve so that the good, undamaged part faced downwards to make contact with the arm. That good part was now damaged as well. The stopper on the steel bracket was bent again.

I understand that circuits which control these headlight motors are setup in such a fashion where they keep sending current to electric motors until the motor encounters a certain amount of mechanical resistance (from the stopper, not to be confused with electrical resistance). At that point the control circuit understands that its time to stop and cuts current to the motor. Perhaps in my case the circuit is not cutting power to the motor early enough.

This pic shows my headlight mechanism The part circled in blue is the bent stopper.



While turning the headlight motor manually to work on this repair I noticed the mechanism would produce a loud click and perform a quick movement near the point when the headlight is completely open. This takes place both when the motor turns forward and when it turns in reverse. Notice how I turn the wrench one way, then reverse it and the click happens both times.



This seems to take place at the point when the two arms in the mechanism became parallel, just slightly before the point when the headlight is completely open. If I turn the motor in the direction to open the headlight, the arm in the mechanism that makes contact with the stopper snaps up and hits the stopper quickly and somewhat violently as soon as it passes the point where both arms line up in parallel. See it here:



Again the other headlight does not do this.

I noticed that the housing and the shaft in the motor move when that click/snapping motion takes place. Watch closely:



I tried to bend the tabs on the metal housing to make a tighter grip on the motor. Its as tight as I can get it. Even when I hold the metal housing and plastic body down I still notice some play in the shaft of the motor.


Anyone have any ideas/comments/suggestions? TIA.


BTW I wanted to embed the videos so that you wouldn't have to be taken to another site to view them, its probably easier for everyone that way. If any of you know how please send a PM and I will change it. Thanks.

RedVertTA

iTrader: (9)

Bump. Please help me out guys ^^^.

vikingramair

I have looked at all your posted videos and i know i have a similar thing going on with my drivers side headlight but not as much as yours and never dropped the white plastic sleeve.
I dont have that noise either.
One question why 3 washers? Have you tried to remove the washers and checked if noise persist? I was thinking of some abnormal tensions in the arms going up/down?

RedVertTA

iTrader: (9)

^^^ Thank you for posting. The washers are there to place pressure on the gear cover and to bring the motor further to the left. The the intention of bringing it further left was to center the point of contact of the arm and the stopper. I thought that by doing so less leverage would be applied to the stopper and there would be less chance that it would bend. It seemed to have helped but does not solve the problem.

vikingramair

Did you had same klick noise before installing the 3 washers? I thinking if you change position on the motor , also you´r messing with the attached arms and maybe you had build in some tension into it? ( only speculation from me....)

I would start with removing the washers, just to disregard some possible root causes. Of course if this problem wasnt before you installed the washers.

RedVertTA

iTrader: (9)

Had been running the washers for a while with no problems. The clicking and jumping motion of the headlight did not take place until long after the washers. The passenger side has the washer setup as well and works fine, the drivers side one is the only one that has been problematic. The arms are not under tension, they have quite a bit of free play articulation (perhaps too much even?).

Does anyone know if there could be something wrong with the internals of the electric motor to cause this?

I thought about wiring a resistor to each side and seeing if lowering the power output of each motor could help keep things intact, thoughts?

vikingramair

Or try with another motor, just to eliminate possible causes.

RedVertTA

iTrader: (9)

^^^ I could. I don't have a spare one though and a new one costs $130.

90sFbody

Whenever i start my car, my lights always pop up. Even when its sunny outside. And when i turn off my car, the passenger side light pops down, but then immediately back up. So when it is parked, the passenger side is always up. When i start my car again, it pops down for a quick second and then both pop back up.

I NEED HELP!

GrahamHill

iTrader: (6)

Anyone have the wiring diagram for the headlights or body control module?

Trying to wire the headlights to the stock switch in a race car

vikingramair

https://ls1tech.com/forums/pontiac-f...8480-what.html

GrahamHill

iTrader: (6)

Thank you sir.

Found this, which is a good find for a 4th gen owner needing wiring help!
http://www.firebirdnation.com/forums...ctory-manuals/

mellor_21

I have a weird problem.

TL;DR - Have power to the headlight connector but the headlight still won't light up, even though it lights from the other side's connector

I tried to replace my high beam on my 01 WS6. The socket that my driver's side high beam connects to was really corroded so I sprayed some pb blaster in it to clean it up a bit. Tried the new headlight and it didn't work, so I tested the headlight on the passenger side's socket and it lit up. So the bulb is good. I checked the corroded socket with a voltmeter and it had power.. but the headlight won't work when plugged in to it. I figured it had to be something to do with the corrosion in the socket so I cut the wires going in to it and checked them on it and it still won't light. I rechecked the wires with the voltmeter, still had power, and rechecked the bulb with the passenger side's socket, still lit up.

I'm at my wit's end. I figure there's something simple here that I'm missing, but I can't figure it out. Can anyone help?

PS I'm debating making this it's own thread, since everything in this one seems to be about the headlight motors.

vikingramair

Does this goes both for low and high on same side? no lights?
ground issue / some **** with connector . I removed the connectors from the socket and cleaned them up with sand paper.

mellor_21

The low beam on the driver's side works on high and low, the high beam just won't come on.
I thought it might be the connectors so I cut the wires going into it and exposed the bare wires to the light's spades and it still won't light, even though my voltmeter is reading 12 to those wires. Yet it comes right on when I plug it into the passenger side's bright socket.

vikingramair

Have you checked the BIG connector located under the headlight assembly?
You have +12volt but what about ground?
Ground for both Hi and Low is shared in that big connector and it has a tendency to corrode very badly.

I have marked the BIG one in red.