I 'm working on my 91 gta and the hatch will not pull down. I monkeyed with it for a few hours today. I went as far as I took the motor out and jumped it with my jump bow it worked up and down fine.
So I'm noticing when I pust down the little switch on the top of the latch I'm not hearing any thing out of the relay. I might add when I push down the switch the compartment light goes out that would lead me to beleive the switch works . maybe relay?????I noticed alot of posts about thses pull downs any insight would be great.

 

First thing to do is test that you have power at the red with white stripe wire which plugs into the blue wire of the hatch pull-down unit.

Lon

 

I have power at the blue wire

 

I doubt it is the relay. The unit will work without a relay. I agree that since the striker-sensing switch is turning on/off the light it should be OK. That makes me think it could be the reversing switch.

Lon Salgren
Top-Down Solutions

 

where is the reverseing switch located? is that the one on the motor attached with 1 phillips screw? Keith

 

That's it.

Lon

 

Lon ,is that part available?is there any thing else to check to make sure it's the reverseing switch?

 

It is available from GM or from my web site as TDS p/n 205180.

Lon

 

Today, on my daughter's '87 Firebird I found out that the hatch would not close fully. It is like it hits the first detent and that is all. The interior light goes out, but the motor does not work. It has done this a few times in the past, and then later it works. Weird.

I am not familiar with the hatch pull down feature. That seems like a good idea gone bad judging from what I have read so far.

Is there a fuse for this unit? How do you test it to find out if it is good (or bad for that matter)?

Thank you for any and all answers!

 

Just take it apart and look at it man. Its pretty easy to understand even if you have never seen one before. Keep in mind that you can find cheap replacement parts at the junk yards but this is a hot item. One out of 30 cars "might" still have the parts avalible. But a day of searching to save 100 bucks or so is worth it. Mine broke because the gear case is made of PLASTIC! and the replacement plastic.... one is 30 bucks.. I'd rather hunt the boneyards.

 

I was in the yards today, but there are not many up here. Three 3rd gens: 2 Camaro's & a Firebird. 2 with the pulldown unit and one manual. All gone of course. But I did snag a few other goodies and they do not charge much of anything.

Funny thing is, when I got home, I saw that the pull down unit had activated and pulled the rear hatch down and tight.

Strange.......strange indeed!

 

I know with mine, it was dead when I bought the car. I went to have a look at it and found that the entire bottom half was shattered into about 50 pieces. All the plastic parts. Definately something you want to rebuild. Get all the goodies from TDS and have a go at it. Easy stuff.

 

UPDATE:

As I was saying on my previous post, when I got home from the junkyard on Saturday, the hatch had pulled itself shut.

Sunday after work, I went out to do some work and unlocked the hatch and it just popped open. The unit did not raise and slowly release the hatch. After that, I found the battery dead.

Today, I charged the battery and started the car. I kept hearing this "whirring" noise while I was driving it around. I believe it to be the hatch pull down motor and that it was running continuously, although when i turned off the car the whirring sound stopped.

What I want to know, since the owner's manual wasn't too helpful, is which specific fuse controls the hatch pull down motor. I just want to deenergize the pull down unit until we decide to fix it or replace it. Or should I just yank the power wire to it?

Thanks,

Steve

 

just unplug it for now. I believe the LID fuse is for the hatch