91 Headlights did not go up in the rain

[Ohjai]

Went out for pizza tonight, when we left Dewey's it was raining.  My headlights came on, but did not raise.  When I turned the car off, the wipers kept wiping.  When I got home and it quit raining, the left headlight went up, and the right one started working correctly once I manually moved the motor.  And the wipers are working normally now.  I searched the archives but did not find a solution, and I looked up the circuit in the manual, but am still a bit puzzled by this format.  I am use to large flat schematics on one sheet.  My short term memory is causing me problems when I have to switch pages.

 

I suppose I need to get my Deoxit out and clean a bunch of connectors.

 

Jim 

[Ronnie]

I''ll take a guess at what might be the problem(s).

 

The headlights might have rounded out crankarms and when the rain gets on them it works as a lubricant allowing the shaft to spin inside them. when it stopped raining and the water dried out there is enough friction inside the rounded out crankarms to raise the doors. Another theory is the headlight motors have bad spots on the commutator and the rain somehow made that worse. Seems unlikely that it would happen to both motors at the same time.

 

I think the wipers continuing to run might be caused by a bad parking mechanism inside the wiper motor that allowed them to continue to run. Seems odd that would happen with the key off but that is the only explanation that I have.

[DAVES89]

And here I thought the the Reatta advice department was closed for the holiday weekend...

[Ohjai]

Daves89, to paraphrase an old National Guard Slogan, "Sleep well tonight your Reatta Owners Journal is awake.

 

The joy of having vintage cars, the Gremlins become active when they are aroused. Once they are awake, we with our special Dick Tracy detection skills seek out these culprits and destroy them.

[Ohjai]

Thanks Ronnie, I suppose I need to order some rebuild kits.  The lights on the Hardtop have been a bit wonky, slam shut, and not a very smooth process.  The previous owner said he had them rebuilt, but we all know what that implies.