Alright, so I have an '86 Camaro and the hatch motor is stuck down and i can't get it to move. I checked the switch in the center and it still works fine. I'm not sure if it's the relay or the motor now.. Also, there is a random small white wire with a small plug on it that I have no idea what it's supposed to go to. I tried checking my haynes manual but it has no wiring diagram for this system.. Any help at all would be greatly appreciated! Thanks guys.

 

common problem these hatch motors! I'd love to know a solution, when I got mine it was stuck down, all working in theory just wouldnt come up...was stood around trying to think what to do next when it randomly came up all by itself! Now mine is stuck again, mate didn't put the hatch down hard enough so it made contact but didn't hold it as it went down. now it doesn't feel like cooperating again.
Do you hear it click when you press the button?

 

IIRC there is a tab in the housing that resets the switch as it goes up or down. If the tab is not lined up correctly it won't reset the switch. WhenI bought my car the PO had disconected my pull down motor, when I Hooked it back up I found my gear had stripped. after buying a new one for $5 from GM, I put it back together wrong and it would only go down.
@smev it should have reset at the bottom and come back up as the switch is not engaged. Mine does this occasionally when the wife doesn't shut it all the way. I just comes back up and latches then pull back down.

 

well, we seem to solve the problem by sticking a screwdriver in it onto what I presume is the tab you speak of. but the times when it goes down without holding the hatch, it doesn't seem to go all the way down and doesn't reset the switch so pressing the button does nothing but trigger the latch and not the motor. when I do stick a screwdriver in it, it winds down a bit first then starts coming back up.
With the hatch it works fine but when it misses I have to do that. Anyway, sorting out a fog light and then I'm just going to avoid opening it :P

 

The white wire with a small black connector on the end was used on the later years (starting 89 or 90) that have a hatch light. That white wire plugs into a black with orange stripe wire to turn on and off the hatch light (there was no manual hatch light switch).

OK, back to solving the hatch pull-down problem. The hatch hook presses on the striker-sensing switch which is attached to the latch with a single small hex-head screw starts the down cycle. The reversing switch which is further down and attached to the clear plastic motor housing with a single phillips-head screw shuts off the motor and reverses the polarity. When the latch is opened the hatch hook releases the striker-sensing switch starting the up cycle. The up cycle ends when the reversing switch is flipped up to shut off the motor and again reverse the polarity to the motor. You must hear a CLICK at the end of both the up and down cycle or the cycle is not completed. It can happen that the down cycle has started, but not completed because the striker-sesning switch was released before the end of the down cycle. If that happens you'll need to re-set the cycle by pressing the striker-sensing switch and holding it down until the motor completes the down cycle (again remember to hear that CLICK). When you release the switch now, the motor should turn on and lift the latch portion all the way up, CLICK, up cycle is complete.

Lon Salgren

 

Thank You all for your input, I will be trying to resolve the issue later today!