[DeTomaso] Headlights don't go up, take II

[Mike Drew]

Charlie,

It's a bit confusing to follow your narrative. You say you opened the motor up, but I assume what you mean is that you opened up the 'transmission' that has the plastic gear inside?  Connected to the electric motor?

The plastic gear (large) has a shaft in the center connected to a small steel gear. That engages the curved gear welded to the headlight bar and raises and lowers the lights. 

It sounds to me as though the interface between the small steel gear and the curved gear on the bar wasn't great and at some point the gear teeth started skipping. 

While you have the mechanism in your hand you should definitely install a metal gear in place of the large plastic one. Otherwise fate will dictate that it breaks 1.0 miles after you put it all back together and drive off!

Are the headlights free to go up and down by hand with the motor and transmission removed?  (Please say yes!)

If so it's just an adjustment issue. Install a new gear just because, reinstall everything, and ensure the interface between the small gear and curved gear on the bar is super tight. It's easily adjusted. Methinks yours got misadjusted.

Mike

Sent from my iPhone

On Aug 31, 2014, at 9:20, Charles McCall <charlesmccall at gmail.com> wrote:

>   Thanks for all the replies regarding how to remove the headlight motor.
> 
> 
>   It wasn't fun, but there are worse jobs. The good news is that I got
>   the headlight motor out and opened it up. The bad news is that it looks
>   perfect.
> 
> 
>   The headlight motor was actually quite well sealed, and took some
>   persuasion to get it open. But the grease was still greasy and the
>   insides looked really in pretty good condition. This is bad news
>   because I was expecting to see a broken plastic gear, which I was
>   betting was the cause of my problem. Since it isn't broken, now I'm
>   sort of out of ideas.
> 
> 
>   Before removing the gear, I had my wife turn the headlights on while I
>   watched the motor. The motor gear turned, the headlights began to raise
>   a quarter inch, but then the gear started skipping and the headlights
>   stopped going up. I had assumed that this juddering was due to a jammed
>   plastic gear.
> 
> 
>   The only other thing that occurs to me is that perhaps the motor has
>   somehow come out of adjustment and wasn't making good contact with the
>   headlight raise mechanism and it was skipping teeth? The motor gear
>   "wheel" was all coated with years of road crud, which may inhibit
>   making good contact, but I've never heard of the teeth of this wheel
>   getting filled up with road crud and not meshing well enough with the
>   raise mechanism.
> 
> 
>   Any other theories other than something moved somehow and the motor and
>   headlight raise mechanism aren't making good contact and I'm skipping
>   teeth? Is it even possible to adjust to engage the teeth more or less?
> 
> 
>   Thanks
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