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Where should I start troubleshooting?


Nas Escobar

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I'm helping a friend fix his 98 Buick Regal and one of the stand out situations on his car is that his power windows don't roll down UNLESS the doors are open. This works for all windows except the driver's which is stuck in the up position no matter what. He told me that water had gotten in the car once by the master power window switches. I did him a favor and got him the piece, but it proved futile as the windows still wouldn't go up or down unless the doors were open. The only thing it helped was that the windows would go down a bit quicker. Not to stock levels but quick enough.

 

I figure this is some sort of short or ground issue, but where should I start looking? I've already switched around the breakers in the fusepanel to see if it was that, but same thing happened.

 

All help is appreciated.

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I would change out all the switches, assuming more than one got wet. I'm not sure where the master "brain" of the window switches are, but I would assume a short in any one of them might mess things up weird like that if wet previously. Hopefully someone else knows a bit more, but that's where I would think to start

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almost sounds like the master switch ground is connected to the door jamb switches (grounded when door open).

 

Considering that I swapped his door switches that control all of the windows, and all it did was give the windows more "speed" as they roll down; this seems like the next logical step.

 

So how would I go about swapping over that, or is it a wire that I would have to reground?

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look up the wiring diagram for the switch and just run new grounds to be safe it wont hurt anything if it doesnt work then heck you have a new ground and if it does work then yay fixed

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All the windows feed thru the master switch and if they only work with the drivers door open, I would suspect a partially broken wire in the driver door pass thru that is making a connection with the door open and not with it closed. Just a thought.

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All the windows feed thru the master switch and if they only work with the drivers door open, I would suspect a partially broken wire in the driver door pass thru that is making a connection with the door open and not with it closed. Just a thought.

 

Well here's the thing... the driver's side window won't roll up or down but the other 3 will when the driver's door is open. The only thing that bothers me about this is that the windows go up and down very slowly on the 3 windows that work. So I'm thinking there's more than a ground issue, but I will check the grounds next time my friend wants to work on his car.

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You should change its switch first.

 

I already did. That was my first thought, I got one from the yard and it got the windows to work because at first they wouldn't go down at all. Now they work but only with the driver's door open. Before, nothing would move them.

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I would think it could also be the power feed to the master switch. I think that power feeds all the other windows.

 

It does, I clearly remember swapping my entire interior and without the driver's door one intact, EVERYTHING is dead. I would take the door panel off and if there's a gap in the harness, have the door closed and depress lightly on each of the wires while holding the window down switch, you might get a reaction which will give you a clue as to which wire is the issue one.

 

Prior to that I would just look for wire damage while the door is open where it hinges and especially if any wires are being crushed by the hinges.

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