Electric roof question. Can it be done?

hey. i have a 1991 cabby. I was wondering if it was possible to put the roof up and down with engine still running? i park the car under a car port that is too low to raise and lower the roof, so i have park it outside, turn the engine off…etc you get the idea.

surely its just an isolator somewhere but i have no idea really.

anyone done this or no how?

thanks

anyone at all?

Yea  it can be done mate, don't know how but know at least one person that's done it.

T

there will likely be an ignition live feed to the system which you need to disconnect, then the system will have no idea if ign is on or not. its usually a black wire, get your multimeter out.

thanks for your help. will have a look tommorow and see if i can sort it out.  

It is a black wire, be carefull where you cut it though as it also controls the windows too if they are electric, leading to the proble that you can only open the windows when the drivers door is open, I cut it by mistake on a mates car when I was wiring an engine in for him, roof would work any time then though but the windows only with door open!!

Hi mate, if you take the switch out from the centre console, you will see a red wire that once tested will go live once ignition is in 1st position….this wire can be traced to the fusebox to a long thin plug with only one wire on it….cut this and run it to the perm live on the fusebox aux terminals….you will need a crimping tool and a crimp or two….halfords sell them.

You would ideally run a fuse inline, cant comment on what size fuse, but I would guess 20-25amps as the roof will draw alot of current.

We we bought the mrs cabby someone had already bypassed this protection so that the roof operated with ignition on or off.

There are two male/female spade connectors on lose wires in the boot by the pump, one of the connectors had been disconnected.

shamstar said

Hi mate, if you take the switch out from the centre console, you will see a red wire that once tested will go live once ignition is in 1st position….this wire can be traced to the fusebox to a long thin plug with only one wire on it….cut this and run it to the perm live on the fusebox aux terminals….you will need a crimping tool and a crimp or two….halfords sell them.

You would ideally run a fuse inline, cant comment on what size fuse, but I would guess 20-25amps as the roof will draw alot of current.

Surely doing that would make it think the ignition was on all the time, so that it'd never work?

yeah what you need to do is disconnect the ignition live feed to it, so it never knows the ignition is on. uaually this wire is black

Madferret said

shamstar said

Hi mate, if you take the switch out from the centre console, you will see a red wire that once tested will go live once ignition is in 1st position….this wire can be traced to the fusebox to a long thin plug with only one wire on it….cut this and run it to the perm live on the fusebox aux terminals….you will need a crimping tool and a crimp or two….halfords sell them.

You would ideally run a fuse inline, cant comment on what size fuse, but I would guess 20-25amps as the roof will draw alot of current.

Surely doing that would make it think the ignition was on all the time, so that it'd never work?

Sorry dude, same wire, except it will go off when switched to 1st position….same wire on same block…I confused myself when I wrote that first…

Loads of ways to skin a cat mate…good luck with it.

cheers for your help guys. not done it yet but should be a doddle now when i get round to it.    THANKS

Ok, i'm going to have a go at this on my Rivage. This is how mine works:

1. Put key in ignition, but don't turn ignition on.
2. Press roof button in centre consol, roof lowers or raises.
3. Turn ignition on, roof doesn't work.

I'm no electrical genius but this is how i'm thinking, the switch must have 2 live feeds from the ignition. 1. for when the key is in the ignition 2. for when the ignition is on.

So there is 2 options for changing how the roof works:

A. Have the roof perminatly live so that you don't need the key to raise/lower the roof.
or
B.  The roof can raise/lower only when the key is in the ignition but able to so when the ignition is on/engine is running.

I'm leaning more towards B as I don't like the fact that the roof would perminantly live. So if I do as SHAMSTAR suggests and trace the black wire from the switch to the fusebox and swap it on to perminant live (with in line fuse), would this then be option B above?

Cheers for help, confused bob. :dontknow:

So I had a go at this today and this is my progress:

Back of roof switch


This is the red wire that goes to the roof switch


And heres where it plugged in to my fuse box


So I crimped on an in line fuse holder, from Maplin £1.99, and connected it to here on my fuse box:



However, all this does is remove the need for the key to be in the ignition to work the roof. I still can't raise/lower the roof when the engine is running  

What have I done wrong or what do I need to do to make the roof work when the engine is running?

Anybody?

Take a look at this pic, it is from the boot of the mrs cabby.

Those two connectors you see at the front were disconnected when we got it, one stops the roof going up and the other down with the ignition on !! There looks to be a diode in each connector. They were actually disconnected because one of the relays had a intermittent shorting fault.

reading this with interest, i decided to un-plug the two connectors as seen in the pic above by lhasadreams. AND IT WORKED, my roof goes up and down with key in ( as before) and now with ignition on (or engine running). and not without the key …..PERFECT

now im a sparky so i can see how this can work, but my question is WHY?  why would VW put these 2 thru-connectors in the first place and does it have an affect on anything else, (i cant see it but its just too easy!)

if something is ture good to be true ………. u know the rest!!


Ideas????

i have no idea how thats possible. I litterally just tried unplugging them both and then 1 at a time and it didnt work at all. how odd.

We could all do with a wiring diagram, but I cannot find one, I did a lot of head scratching when trying to find out why the roof worked with the ignition on !!
The Bentley wiring diagrams are all for the USA which appears to use a much different roof control module.

freeman, now u've just thrown another  twist in to it!!

if it works on 2…….

mines a k plate so maybe diff 2 yours?? but i think they would all be the same, shit they only made it over 2-3 years!

red and green wires either side of each thruway?

i second the need 4 a wiring diagram.

but i think we have answered the original post, or at least for 66% of peeps