headlight down mod not working, any ideas?

[jimbonismo]

Ok i did the headlight mod, like 10 years ago on my 87 NT and it was fine and it worked, nuff said.
i tried the same mod on my 87 turbo and it doesn't work, even with the plug off the headlights pop up still.
any ideas? all the fuses under the dash are good

any help i would appreciate
thanks
jimmy

[NIVO]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

are you disconnecting it from the steering column?
the headlight up button not pressed in?

highbeams not on?

sorry basic questions but you know.. need to know.

[jimbonismo]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

Yes disconnected at steering column and low beams are on.

I felt this may be an electrical problem, I am knowledgable wwith nissans and wondered if someone had a similar problem.......

The fuses insidee the car are good also

Thanks

[Mitchd03]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

There is an alternate, slightly trickier way of doing the headlight down mod that I discovered.
You need to find the headlight uphold relay I think its called, on a right hand drive car its stashed behind the quarter panel, behind the cruise control unit (where the battery is on a US car).
To test if its the right relay, unplug it and flash the highbeams. The headlights wont pop up or stay on after you release the flasher. If you unplug the motor, the

To get the headlights to pop up and down still, either jump the connectors with a bit of wire and some terminals, or you can solder the relay closed. This makes the headlight go up and down with the button on the dash, but putting highbeam on etc. doesn't pop them up.
You can also put the headlights up and down without turning them off.

It does this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN4fEUVWYb8[/video]]

Sorry, for some reason youtube didn't let the sound stay, so you cant here me commenting.

Here's a how-to on a RHD car: http://www.auz31club.com/viewtopic.php?p=2668
Let me re-download the US service manual and I'll try and find the us equivalent relay.

[Mitchd03]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

Ok, here is a diagram of the relay location in a US car, taken from the service manual.


Relay number 64E on left of the car (not the left of the image) is the headlight relay, relay 6E is the uphold relay.

You want the headlight relay near the headlight timer, its on the drivers side of the car (regardless of if the car is LHD or RHD).
If you jump pin 1 and 2 together and pins 3 and 4 together, your headlight switch wont pop the headlights up, only the button on the gauge cluster surround will pop it up.

Alternatively, you could cut the wire that comes off the back of pin 5, though I don't know if this will work correctly.

[elba85Z]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

Honestly, just take out the fuses that control your headlight motors. It will keep your lights on, but they won't pop up.

[jimbonismo]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

You see I want them to come up with the dash button still like with my 87na. I am a little bothered because. My turbo is a 87 and just unplugging the plug @ the steering column.
I will probably jump the relay thanks for the info and the schematic I will post a reply once I get it working to my liking


Thanks
Jimmy j

[Careless]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

elba85Z wrote: Honestly, just take out the fuses that control your headlight motors. It will keep your lights on, but they won't pop up.

wow. forgive me for saying that's a rather idiotic piece of advice.

what he's trying to do here is have the headlights stay down during normal use, but there may be a reason to still have the functionality to pop them up without having to pop fuses in or plug in motors again. i.e. - from within the car at a flick of a switch.

I'm pretty sure he would have thought of removing the fuses if he didn't care for the headlights to be able to rise.

[inqui-Z-tor]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

jimbonismo wrote: Ok i did the headlight mod, like 10 years ago on my 87 NT and it was fine and it worked, nuff said.
i tried the same mod on my 87 turbo and it doesn't work, even with the plug off the headlights pop up still.
any ideas? all the fuses under the dash are good

any help i would appreciate
thanks
jimmy

My guess it's your column switch. Contacts are probably worn or dirty. Mine has that issue once in a while.

[Careless]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

[quote]inqui-Z-tor wrote:

Ok i did the headlight mod, like 10 years ago on my 87 NT and it was fine and it worked, nuff said.
i tried the same mod on my 87 turbo and it doesn't work, even with the plug off the headlights pop up still.
any ideas? all the fuses under the dash are good

any help i would appreciate
thanks
jimmy
My guess it's your column switch. Contacts are probably worn or dirty. Mine has that issue once in a while.

Mine too. I kinda find it weird that the headlights will go up, but the high-beams will not be on. But usually it's only the high-beams that toss the headlights up, so it's kinda weird!

[Mitchd03]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

jimbonismo wrote: You see I want them to come up with the dash button still like with my 87na. I am a little bothered because. My turbo is a 87 and just unplugging the plug @ the steering column.
I will probably jump the relay thanks for the info and the schematic I will post a reply once I get it working to my liking


Thanks
Jimmy j

The method I described works like that, but you can also put the headlights back down without turning the lights off.

EDIT: Also its not hard to do. It took me 40 minutes buried in the service manual to check, double check and triple check I wasn't about to melt my wiring loom and set the car on fire, another 10 minutes to find the right relay on a RHD car (us service manual) then about 15 minutes to pull relay out and jump it.
I did this because I originally did the normal unplug the connector method, and got annoyed at having the lights pop up and stay up whenever I hit the highbeams.

[SATAN]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

This is not going to help anyone, but figured I would post it anyways...


I did the headlight down mod on Niki's AE and it didn't work. I didn't understand why. It has worked in every other z31 I have had. Since it didn't work, I didn't bother to hook it back up. The next day when I went to turn on the head lights, for some reason it started working the way I wanted, headlights down and on. I didn't touch anything else. After it didn't work the first time, I gave up and left it alone. It has been working perfectly ever since.

[inqui-Z-tor]

Re: ok the headlight down mod is not working for me , any ideas?

SATAN wrote: This is not going to help anyone, but figured I would post it anyways...


I did the headlight down mod on Niki's AE and it didn't work. I didn't understand why. It has worked in every other z31 I have had. Since it didn't work, I didn't bother to hook it back up. The next day when I went to turn on the head lights, for some reason it started working the way I wanted, headlights down and on. I didn't touch anything else. After it didn't work the first time, I gave up and left it alone. It has been working perfectly ever since.

I still think it's the stalk/steering column switch. Mine works fine 90% of the time. Then for whatever reason. It'll stop working. Turing the switch, raises the lights and turns them on. Turn the switch, lights go down, lights go off. If I do it rapidly .. the lights will go on, but the lights stay "down"??

[Mitchd03]

The problem with that is close highbeam contacts, when you turn the lights on, one of the highbeams flick on. I had this problem with the stalk that came with the car, I'd be driving down the road on a cold night and the kerb side highbeam would flash. Then with my next indicator stalk, whenever I held the left lane change indicator (where you hold the stalk left without it clicking) the highbeam would flash.
It's actually the reason I looked for an alternative way of doing it.

[Careless]

Mitchd03 wrote: The problem with that is close highbeam contacts, when you turn the lights on, one of the highbeams flick on. I had this problem with the stalk that came with the car, I'd be driving down the road on a cold night and the kerb side highbeam would flash. Then with my next indicator stalk, whenever I held the left lane change indicator (where you hold the stalk left without it clicking) the highbeam would flash.
It's actually the reason I looked for an alternative way of doing it.

I like the way you did it. I think I'm going to hollow out a fuse and make some jumpers.