Question: Sticking headlight

[cormorant71]

Hi Everyone,

I just joined, and just bought my first Corvette! 1987 convertible. It is the graduation present my parents could never get me.

I will be doing a rolling restoration and I am sure I will be posting a lot of questions; here is my first.

The passenger side headlight gets stuck on something when I turn the lights off. It is fine when I turn them on, but it needs about 2" more of rotation to fully close. All I have to do it tap it lightly and it frees up and closes completely.

When I turn the lights on and off with the hood up it works fine. My initial thought was it was getting stuck on the fender bracket; so I removed it and cycled the lights. But it still got stuck.

Any Ideas?

Thanks,

Chris

 

[garyg]

I own a 1988 C4 and about 15 yrs ago I had the same problem. I had to replace the headlight actuator, my suggestion is to watch the video on YouTube " C4 corvette headlight Repair". It is simple for you to do , I remember it is easier to remove the assembly and work on your kitchen table then trying to do it while the headlight is still on the car.

Hi Everyone,

I just joined, and just bought my first Corvette! 1987 convertible. It is the graduation present my parents could never get me.

I will be doing a rolling restoration and I am sure I will be posting a lot of questions; here is my first.

The passenger side headlight gets stuck on something when I turn the lights off. It is fine when I turn them on, but it needs about 2" more of rotation to fully close. All I have to do it tap it lightly and it frees up and closes completely.

When I turn the lights on and off with the hood up it works fine. My initial thought was it was getting stuck on the fender bracket; so I removed it and cycled the lights. But it still got stuck.

Any Ideas?

Thanks,

Chris

 

[Larry]

C4 headlight repair. Mine is a 1990.

Get an Ecklers catalog or online. They sell new headlight headlight motors, rebuilt motors, repair kits and replacemnt gears. For my 1990, I was able to do the repair myself.

I bought Eckler's two repair kit #29304 for $6 each. Kit consists of three plastic bushing to replace the original material inside the gear housing. Original material deteriorates over time and the gearing freewheels. Repair takes about 2 hours per headlight. I took the assemblies out of the car for this repair. T30, T27 Torx bits. 10 mm and 13 mm sockets, small punch, hammer. Kit includes instructions. I also found "how to" repair instruction on internet... www.corvettefever.com/howto/33098. Replacing bushings will most likely repair the problem. If the interfacing gear part is also bad, you can purchase that too for about $25 each. This was a pretty satisfying repair and a good one to start on with your rolling restoration.

I notice that Eckler's catalog appears to indicate the 1987 is different from my 1990 but there are still parts available there to rebuild or replace as required.

 

[cormorant71]

I own a 1988 C4 and about 15 yrs ago I had the same problem. I had to replace the headlight actuator, my suggestion is to watch the video on YouTube " C4 corvette headlight Repair". It is simple for you to do , I remember it is easier to remove the assembly and work on your kitchen table then trying to do it while the headlight is still on the car.

Thanks.

As soon as it stops raining and the temp. gets above 40 I will be getting to work on it.

Chris

 

[93 PoloGreen]

sticking headlight

My 1990 ZR-1 had a sticking headlight about 2" on the right side when I first get it. It turned out to be sticking on the horn as it was turned up. Check it out as this was a easy, cheap fix. Good luck.

 

[cormorant71]

My 1990 ZR-1 had a sticking headlight about 2" on the right side when I first get it. It turned out to be sticking on the horn as it was turned up. Check it out as this was a easy, cheap fix. Good luck.

Thanks, that sounds like an easy fix, i will let you know the results.

i love your 93 polo green vette. i looked at one, but it was too much for my budjet

thanks again

 

[Hot Rod Roy]

This is interesting: garyg has an '88. Larry and 93PoloGreen both have '90's. All of these 'vettes have the late style headlight motors (which have the manual control kno.b`s on the top of the motors. Cormorant71 has an '87 with the early style headlight motors (which have the manual control kno.b`s on the bottom of the motors). These are totally different designs, so none of these suggestions will help cormorant71.
The most common reason for this problem in the early style motors ('84-'87) is dirty limit switches inside the motor. These switches are on the motor armature shaft, and they detect when the headlight doors have opened or closed all the way against the stops. The late style headlight motors do not have these limit switches.
Cost to repair: zero!

:cool

p.s. I used kno.b`s because the word knob is sometimes censored!

 

[cormorant71]

thanks roy for the great insight.

but how do i fix it? :eyerole

 

[Hot Rod Roy]

I couldn't find an answer for you on this forum, so here's a link to a thread on the CorvetteForum.com website: http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c4-t...placement.html This shows both the gear repair, and mentions the cleaning of the limit switches, which I suspect is your problem.

:cool

 

[cormorant71]

I couldn't find an answer for you on this forum, so here's a link to a thread on the CorvetteForum.com website: http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c4-t...placement.html This shows both the gear repair, and mentions the cleaning of the limit switches, which I suspect is your problem.

:cool

thanks again, that is very helpful