Is there a quick fix for this? I've had switch problems before and if the housing is not too brittle a careful clean often gets results but these dang lights sit up all the time. Lights turn on and off fine but nothing seems to want to make them go down - need help

 

Ya theres a quick fix. You could always buy the flush headlights from cpracing.ca. Not too bad. You could have some bad wires to the light motor or a bad connection. Check those first then get back to us.

 

there is a small black box called an "ocillator" try removing that and shaking the water out of it. usually water gets trapped inside and shorts it out.

EDIT- i forgot. the ocillator is located ahead of the battery. you will have to remove the battery and its located on a small mount near the radiator bracket. sometimes the clips on the ocillator break and it may be hanging by its wires. who knows, its worth a shot.

 

also, remove the plug going to the headlight motor. use a voltmeter and test to see if you are getting power to the motors.

 

my car's lights wouldn't go down, and it turned out that the switch in the dash board that keeps them up, was unplugged. Plugged it back in, and bam! down they went....

There's also a fuse in the fuse box labeled "Illum" which controls the "going down" feature of the headlights, as well as the side markers, and park lights and the dash board lights.... my car's used to always blow until I found a shorted wire for the light motors that was pinched between the battery and the chassis of the car, it must've only been shorting every once in a while.... this was the reason I unplugged the headlight switch in the dash

so if you're having problems with your dash lights and stuff, that might be your problem.

 

Thanks all for the info - I'll try to trace the circuit and I didn't know about the ILLUM fuse either. This is the sort of previous user/real experience I joined the club to get.

 

I should've mentioned, I don't know what year you have, but mine's a '79, which had some different stuff in it... can anyone verify the existance of the "illum" fuse on an 81-85?