I had 290 in parking tickets, so I parked my car, saved my money for three months without starting it, payed the tickets, registered my car, jump started my car and now the rear hatch won't close all the way. Why is it doing this, and how do I fix it? Thanks guys.

Time to do some diagnosis. Grab hold of the latch. See if you get movement up and down. If so your clear plastic hatch motor housing is broken and needs to be replaced. If you get movement side-to-side or front to back then the guides are bad and need to be replaced. Both are available from my web site TDS aka Top-Down Solutions. Just click on the sponsor link over there---->

Check out the Tech Article for repairing your 86-87 & 88-91 hatch pull-down units I wrote that is posted on ThirdGen.org.

Lon Salgren

I'm sure it's probably the motor, because i don't see how the guides could be bad if i didn't touch the car for a couple of months.

I just bought my car and mine doesn't work. I want to fixt it but the car needs a lot and its lower on the list of priorities at the moment. The plastic is bad on my motor and the guides are cracking too. So I lowered it to nearly its lowest point, drilled a couple of holes and secured it. The holes are in a place that will not ruin the assembly once I can afford to do it the non ******* way. I had to secure it because one side was higher and letting exhaust in. I dont recommend doing it that way but I did.

I have customers that have repaired theirs back to functional after someone jerry-rigged it into a slam latch.

Follow the instructions in my Tech Article so you're aware of how to disassemble it and test for what is wrong. Once you have the reversing switch off of the motor you can put +/- 12v to the two terminals on the motor to see if it is good or bad. I doubt your motor is bad, however if it is noisy from bad bearings then go ahead and replace it. I suspect either the reversing switch or striker-sensing switch have corroded contacts. But, hey what do I know. I've only repaired a few (hundered or so).

Lon