Headlight buckets rotate up but lights don't work
08-09-2012, 11:22 PM
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Headlight buckets rotate up but lights don't work
Car: 1984 Porsche 944, 4 cyl engine, manual tranny
Owners:
Me, former small engine mechanic, have re-built 6 & 8 cyl car and truck engines and a few Diesel truck engines. Can read schematics (usually!).
My nephew: college degree in engineering, smart, energetic and doggedly stubborn (sometimes).
Problem: Headlights rotate up and down okay. Headlights should come on when up but don't. High beams light up but don't stay on when the column stalk is pulled back.
Headlight bulbs test good on both filaments. Fuses either tested good or were replaced.
Checked for voltage at headlight fittings. Getting inconsistent, non-repeatable results. High and low beam terminals may show 12v or nothing; sometimes shows 5-7v. High beam terminal usually shows 12v when the hi/low dimmer switch (left stalk on steering column) is pulled back.
Hi/low dimmer switch will turn on high beam filament AND indicator light on the dash panel but high beam won't stay on when the switch is released. The indicator light dims but stays on when the stalk is released as long as the headlight switch on the dash is fully on. Indicator light for high beam always comes on when stalk is pulled back but usually goes out when stalk is released. Once or twice, the high beam indicator stayed on when stalk was released and high beam filament in headlight stayed on also.
We are not sure if the hi/low dimmer switch is supposed to keep the high beams on when released. Is it a cam-like action, i.e. pull once to turn on, pull second time to turn off?
Headlight switch on dash has 2 positions. 1st position turns on dash panel lights and side marker lights. It also MUST be on for dash gauges (temp, gas, volts) to work. (Is that normal????) 2nd position rotates the headlight buckets up.
We suspect either the headlight switch on the dash or the hi/low dimmer switch on the steering column is defective or working intermittently.
Any advice, comments, questions or suggestions will be appreciated. We are stumped!
We found indications that someone did patchwork repairs on the car at some time and we decided he must have been an idiot for doing so. We are greatly concerned that there are still two idiots working on the car...........
Darrell
PS: This is our first post on this forum. I'm not even sure if I'm in the right section. The only thing I'm sure of is we can't figure out the light problem and we will be back with more questions later on since neither one of us has even worked on a Porsche before!
Owners:
Me, former small engine mechanic, have re-built 6 & 8 cyl car and truck engines and a few Diesel truck engines. Can read schematics (usually!).
My nephew: college degree in engineering, smart, energetic and doggedly stubborn (sometimes).
Problem: Headlights rotate up and down okay. Headlights should come on when up but don't. High beams light up but don't stay on when the column stalk is pulled back.
Headlight bulbs test good on both filaments. Fuses either tested good or were replaced.
Checked for voltage at headlight fittings. Getting inconsistent, non-repeatable results. High and low beam terminals may show 12v or nothing; sometimes shows 5-7v. High beam terminal usually shows 12v when the hi/low dimmer switch (left stalk on steering column) is pulled back.
Hi/low dimmer switch will turn on high beam filament AND indicator light on the dash panel but high beam won't stay on when the switch is released. The indicator light dims but stays on when the stalk is released as long as the headlight switch on the dash is fully on. Indicator light for high beam always comes on when stalk is pulled back but usually goes out when stalk is released. Once or twice, the high beam indicator stayed on when stalk was released and high beam filament in headlight stayed on also.
We are not sure if the hi/low dimmer switch is supposed to keep the high beams on when released. Is it a cam-like action, i.e. pull once to turn on, pull second time to turn off?
Headlight switch on dash has 2 positions. 1st position turns on dash panel lights and side marker lights. It also MUST be on for dash gauges (temp, gas, volts) to work. (Is that normal????) 2nd position rotates the headlight buckets up.
We suspect either the headlight switch on the dash or the hi/low dimmer switch on the steering column is defective or working intermittently.
Any advice, comments, questions or suggestions will be appreciated. We are stumped!
We found indications that someone did patchwork repairs on the car at some time and we decided he must have been an idiot for doing so. We are greatly concerned that there are still two idiots working on the car...........
Darrell
PS: This is our first post on this forum. I'm not even sure if I'm in the right section. The only thing I'm sure of is we can't figure out the light problem and we will be back with more questions later on since neither one of us has even worked on a Porsche before!
