Sunroof

[pauljmcnulty]

Hi all,

Apologies for not doing the research, but I'm off to work and don't have time to trawl Clark's Garage!

My sunroof has never faltered until yesterday. It worked fine in the morning, but on the way home there's nothing from the switch at all. When stopped, I tried it on key position 1, and the arms retract fine. Of course, they don't go back though. []

So, not the swith or motor, cable or gears, fuse etc. I guess? My first thought is the front microswitch, but the roof's never been removed in my time so can't see why that would stop suddenly... [8|]

 

[zcacogp]

Paul, If the roof's never been removed then what were you doing retracting the arms? If the motor is silent and nothing is moving then it is probably a switch problem; a microswitch somewhere (in the roof or on the motor) or even possibly the switch you push in the dashboard. The microswitches do go out of alignment; the one in the roof of my car jammed itself closed against the plastic surround earlier this year for no good reason. 'Twas a five minute job to take it out, bend it straight and clip it back in again but I have no reason what caused it to happen. (I blame thermal expansion and contraction due to all the stinking hot weather we are having these days. Oh, wait a moment .... []) Oli.

 

[andy watson]

New switch required! But - try taking the roof out now that the arms are retracted and then refit and see if the micro switch clicks into action

 

[pauljmcnulty]

If the roof's never been removed then what were you doing retracting the arms?

I'm a man. And an idiot. [&o] My thought was to see if the motor, dash switch, cable, gears etc. were working, despite nothing when trying to "tilt" the roof. Trying with it in "accessories" seemed sensible, and does prove all these are working fine. Of course, I should have thought that I might not be able to latch it back in again. [&:]

 

[Sam Mugg]

Hi Paul, Had the same problem with mine. If you open the boot take the panel off the nearside rear wing and clean all the connections on the motor hopefully it will work. Mine did, only took about fifteen minutes.

 

[pauljmcnulty]

But - try taking the roof out now that the arms are retracted and then refit and see if the micro switch clicks into action

Not even needed, just banging the switch and I got contact for a couple of seconds, so the roof is secured again. Thanks to everyone who didn't steal my car today....[] So. A thought occured whilst thrashing it around tonight. Why is there a switch in the front, and could it just be by-passed? It senses when the roof is in place, but by definition, I only want to use the electrics when the flippin' thing IS in place. It's not a clever switch that knows you've removed and replaced the roof, and does something different; it seems only to avoid you having the option of raising and lowering the arms when the engine is running, and the roof not in place? I guess I'm missing something, but can't for the life of me see why it's needed. [8|]

 

[zcacogp]

ORIGINAL: pauljmcnulty Thanks to everyone who didn't steal my car today....[]

That's fine Paul. I probably won't steal it tomorrow either.

ORIGINAL: pauljmcnulty Why is there a switch in the front, and could it just be by-passed? It senses when the roof is in place, but by definition, I only want to use the electrics when the flippin' thing IS in place. It's not a clever switch that knows you've removed and replaced the roof, and does something different; it seems only to avoid you having the option of raising and lowering the arms when the engine is running, and the roof not in place?

As you said - it tells the car whether the roof is in place or not. And (little known fact coming up), it is wired into the central locking system. If you turn the car off, replace the sunroof and then lock the car then the arms move up and engage in the back of the sunroof. If it didn't have the switch then it wouldn't be able to do this, as the car wouldn't know whether the sunroof had been replaced or not. Oli.

 

[944Turbo]

My front switch packed up, I took it out and sprayed it with contact cleaner while exercising it and it started working again and has been fine since, some years later. If you get stuck again there is a nut on the motor (pic in the handbook) you can wind manually there is a tool in the tool kit too - might be the plug spanner.

 

[DavidL]

A timely thread. My sunroof packed up one day a week or two ago. I opened it on the way to work and then it wouldn't close. Just pleased it didn't rain that day. Closed it manually and it was added to the "list" I had a spare hour tonight so I took the rocker switch out and followed clarks garage. Its a bit vague on the testing of the console switch so I wondered if anyone who has a spare and a multimeter would confirm they can get the same results as CG. I found the first bit (2-5 and 1-3) is with the rocker switched to the close roof and the others for the open roof - at least that's what gave me 3 out of 4 correct resistance readings. The last one 2-4 gave me a reading of 1 regardless of switch position. So maybe that's my problem? Anyone out there with chance to corroborate the findings? I'm a bit reluctant to take the roof out but the centre switch appears to be next to test.

 

[pauljmcnulty]

As you said - it tells the car whether the roof is in place or not. And (little known fact coming up), it is wired into the central locking system. If you turn the car off, replace the sunroof and then lock the car then the arms move up and engage in the back of the sunroof. If it didn't have the switch then it wouldn't be able to do this, as the car wouldn't know whether the sunroof had been replaced or not.

Hi Oli, So...... Assuming one didn't know the roof has this self-closing thing (I didn't), what purpose does it serve, and would by-passing the switch have any negative effect? I could understand if the roof closed with the locking. I've lost count of the times I've left it open and the alarm has gone off, or it's rained. My car does tend to get driven to events with the roof open, as I almost always have it up, and I always forget to close it before walking to the other side of somewhere like Silverstone! Automatically re-latching the already closed, and just replaced, roof is nice, but in reality I'd guess that few of us take the panel out that often, and then forget to secure it?

 

[zcacogp]

Paul, It's a while since I have done this sort of thing, but you need to do what's called a 'Stateful Inspection' of the machine and think about what effect removing the switch would have. The switch tells the car whether the sunroof is in or not. This allows it to: 1. Retract the arms if the roof is in, the arms are at 'Down' (not 'Retracted'), ignition is in Pos1 and the 'Up' sunroof switch is pressed. If the roof is NOT in under these conditions then the arms will be already retracted - i.e. this is a state you should not be able to get into if the sunroof is out of the car (arms in the 'Down' position but the sunroof is out of the car). 2. Extend the arms to engage with the roof if the roof is in but the arms are 'Retracted' and the car is locked. If the roof is NOT in under these circumstances then nothing happens. 3. Extend the arms if the roof is in, the ignition on, the arms 'Retracted' and the 'Up' sunroof switch is pressed. If the roof is NOT in under these circumstances then nothing happens. There are probably other such states which apply but I can't think of them at the moment. If you just wired the switch out of circuit then I think the system would get confused and you may find you can get into a state you then find hard to get out of (but I have had too much to drink this evening to work out the details of that!) What would be easy to do would be to remove the centre roof switch and replace it with a manual toggle switch on the dashboard, which you need to flip whenever you remove or replace the roof. You may also, with a bit more rewiring, be able to make the roof work without the centre switch if you were prepared to sacrifice the self-raising of the arms when you lock the car having replaced the roof. Again, that would require more thought that my brain is able to give at the moment. (Actually, if push came to shove you could wire the switch such that one side moves the arms one way and the other side moves the arms the other way, and you just have to learn when to let them stop for the various positions; Up, Down and Retracted.) An auto-close sunroof would be a fairly easy thing to arrange with an aftermarket alarm. In fact, it's one thing that I keep on meaning to wire my alarm up to do whenever I have the time and a warm enough day to work on it. However it's not an urgent job so it's right at the back of the list ... Oli.