ok so i just bought my bird and everything is beautiful except the headlights are stuck up. now are they supposed to go down automatically when i turn the lights off? is there a fuse theyre wired to? or last resort, is there any way to crank them down by hand? i saw a gray **** on each motor, tried turning it but no results. any ideas? thanks

 

More than likely you have a bad headlight motor. They tend to crap out sometimes. They sell rebuild kits and new motors all over the place, or you could try your local junkyard.

 

yeah i was afraid of that. how hard are they to change? also is there any way i can get them to go down by hand?

 

Yes you could. My guess would be taking out the entire headlight and realigning it in the down position. However, that would be kinda bad. If for some reason you needed the lights on, what would you do? You can't really pull over to the side of the road and pull them back out to align them up. My advice would be to leave them up until you get the new motors. It may look kinda bad, but it will save you time in the long run. Headlight motors don't go for too much these days, especially if you find any at a local junkyard. I'd say $30 tops at a junkyard.

 

ok well i guess i have some junkyarding to do. thanks

 

If you flip the switch to whatever way you want the lights, there are little cranks under the hood next to the light. If you turn the lights on and turn those the lights will go up, and the same for putting them down. Its a pain in the *** put I've had to do it before and it beats driving around with those ugly things up all teh time.

 

save your wrists

there is hole on top of the ****, insert pen or pencil and turn. It takes a very long time to do by hand, 15 secs with pen.

lights are very useful for night driving

 

Before you take everything out of the car to replace the motors, try replacing the headlight motor relay. Try looking by the radiator support on the passenger side, you may need a wire diagram to find the corect wire color. There are a few in that area. I would unplug the headlight motors first and check with a voltmeter, no volts either way = bad relay.

 

From what you described, both headlights are stuck in the up position. That would most likely indicate a wiring, relay, or switch problem rather than a motor problem, It is extremely unlikely that both motors would fail at exactly the same time in the same position. It could easily be your headlight switch(mine did the same thing, replaced the switch and fixed the problem). It could also be a relay, or a ground, etc. Check the basics first, it could save you a lot of money since headlight motors are not cheap, and a PITA to replace. Most of the time it's the simple things that solve the problem.

 

yeah i know its unlikely but it was like that when i bought the car. thats what made me wonder if one went out, then a while later the other one went out and they just happened to both go out stuck up. i fixed it for now though, i just pushed on that little rod and they went down nice and easy. and when i want them up i just pull them up and they seem to stay without any trouble. it is a PITA when it starts raining though so ill have to fix it one of these days.

come to think of it, my moms out in it right now and its raining. i wonder if she realizes she has no headlights

oh well i guess its my fault for letting her drive my car to get groceries