81 gli cabby serious electrical gremlins!

Ok, heres the list and what I've tried so far,

Wipers/washers only work, (with the stalk on any setting,) when they feel like it. Some times wiggling wires near the fusebox works and sometimes it doesn't!  Sometimes they randomly decide to work all on their own without touching anything!  I'm going to have a look at the switches today (i have spares if they're shot,) but other than that I'm stumped!

Heater blower works in tune with the wipers, same time exactly. if the wipers work the blower will, if they go off so does the blower!

temperature warning light flickers randomly when the engine is warm.  I cant get the dash out far enough to have look and see if theres a prob with the gauge (actual gauge works ok.)

I've had the fusebox out, and there seems to be a few spare leads dangling about?  two have medium sized female blades, one has a female bullet?  I could do with a list of relay connections as haynes is stupidly awkward to read!

Any ideas?

Jon.

Hi Jon -

Sounds like you are all over the plcae - send me your email address via a PM and I'll send you a couple of PDF's of wiring diagrams which are significantly easier to read than the haynes manual - which i find about as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike for tracing circuits.

MP

there normally are some connection not used, so don't be to alarmed by wires not connected, sounds like either water in the wiper relay or water damage to the fuse box, when u removed the fuse box, what we're the connections like on the rear? any burning??
where abouts are you too?

I'm at coningsby, lincolnshire.

Fusebox looks really good, no buring or anything.  I've replaced the wiper relay with an intermittan wipe one from our old mk2 which worked ok, and the mk1's relay worked fine in the mk2!!!

Theres no water damage inside at all, we did have a bit of smoke from the h/light switch when we brought it home, (the switch fell out of the dash when Em my girlfriend whose car it is, turned it off and started to smoke, so must have touched something.)

Could that have been to do with it? I'm not really sure where all the earths are and I'm struggling to get enough room to see!

Jon.

Had another go today, and have managed to fix the wipers and the blowers.  Seems that the connector wasn't on the wiper motor properly!

I've been through everything I can find connected to the temp gauge, including double checking earths and cleaning contacts.

It now works properly withoout the lights on, but turn them on and it flickers intermitantly, and at low revs the dash lights flicker as well.  Is this a problem with the earth behind the dash? If so where is it?

Jon.

Have a look at This Previous Post  To help you locate all the earthing points.

i have an 1981 gli cab too, and gues what….. yes i have pretty much the same problems, i push the relay and the wipers an heater work fine! i earted the neg of the battery to the gearbox and the body (2 seperate wires) this worked a treat with my instrument display. however to be honest it seems to me that with these cars, if a few 'have a go heros have owned the car in the past it will take quite some time to fix the gremlins! im getting there but ive spent over ?800 on the various jobs.

also Michael can u please mail me the diagrams?

oioi321 … PM me with an email address & I'll fix you up

MP

I have the haynes manual with full wiring diagram of every bit of the golf mk1 live in holbeach if you get stuck.

Ok, an update!

I put an earth lead onto the cam cover on monday morning, this seemed to sort the problem, infact both the wipers and blower worked all the way out to grantham and back.  Then on tuesday morning in heavy rain they stopped.  Em says that driving in the dark in heavy rain with your head out of the window isn't much fun!

So on weds I speant the whole morning with varying diagrams, and found a couple of things out,

1.  part of the dash ribbon is burnt out.  godknows what it's supposed to do but other than the temp warning light (which only seems to flash when the lights are on,) the dash is fine.  

2. at some point in time it has had a couple of leads bridged in from the headlight circuit.  I gave up and called an auto electrician out to have a look.  turns out that they had bridged a constant + feed to the blowers from the headlight switch, which due to the uprated headlight loom isn't carrying a very high amp feed.  Sorting this (by bridging an ignition +feed to the blowers, properly, not by ruddy scotchlocks,) has cured both the wiper and blowers.

3. damn fan switch has died.  Solved this quick and easy with a switch on the dash to turn it on and off.  That'll do till I can get an expansion tank system fitted.

So thanks for all the help everyone! We got there in the end!!!

Jon+Em

Well done - & worth the ?100 to sort.  You could have chased this for ages.

MP