Aftermarket 5-wire central locking actuators.

Hi all,

I have recently purchased 2 replacement 5-wire actuators for my mk1 cabby.  There was an aftermarket central locking kit in the car when I bought it but a few years back they started going haywire, locking and unlocking themselves in wet weather.  Being the 'act first, think later' type, one dark, rainy, winter night I ripped the actuator out of the drivers door and binned it, then when pulling the passenger side actuator out I noticed that the wires were all wet so must have been grounding the lock and unlock wires, causing to lock and unlock repeatedly…  It was too late by then though!

The new actuators have different coloured wires to what's in my doors.  The passenger side door has 5 random coloured wires and the ones in the drivers door are all black, just to confuse things further!  I can use a my multi meter to figure out the ground in each door and then use my alarm fob to lock and unlock and check for positive spikes on 2 of the other cables to figure out which is which.

Anyway, my query.  There will be 2 remaining wires in each door which will be for the unlock and lock signal, when the key is turned in the lock.  Whilst I appreciate it's not essential as I can use the alarm to lock and unlock, I want to wire them up for completeness.    Am I right in thinking that they are both grounded temporarily when the lock is turned to either the lock or unlock position?  Therefore, if I apply ground to the wires in turn to test they will cause both actuators to lock or unlock, depending on which wire is grounded?

If some clever bod could let me know if this is the case and I can just ground them to test then that would be fab and I'll love you forever (not in a gritty man-love way!)

Cheers,

Nick

I'd have thought 2 of the wires are the power wires for the motor (up and down would be opposite voltages eg wire 1 0V, wire 2 12V to go up, down would be wire 1 12V wire 2 0V).

The other 3 wires would be a dual throw switch with a common centre connector; a make for up; and a make for down.

The remote blipper might not activate the up/down switch.

I'd not be connecting any of them wires to earth, except via a voltmeter to sense voltage on them.

Thanks for the reply, Paul.

Yep, no worries, will certainly be testing the 2 remaining wires with my meter before grounding anything.

From what little info I've managed to uncover it seems these 5-wire actuators are -ve triggered, so the 2 remaining cables should be fairly straight forward to work out… But hey, if I blow the lot then at least I tried!

the lock/unlock wires go to ground depending on what position the lock is in:

blue - unlock power (+12v to unlock)
green - lock power (+12v to lock)

brown - lock signal (earthed when locked)
white - unlock signal (earthed when unlocked)
black - earth

edit: some of the above may be the wrong way round but I'm pretty sure its right. as in blue may be lock and green unlock, brown unlock signal and while lock signal if you get me. it also depends how the actuator is installed as to which is which, for example in a door when the actuator is extended it would be 'unlocked' but for a petrol flap extended would be locked

Thanks for the help guys, all wired up and working fine.