well, finally last night they died. They had been working most of the time; only cutting out sporadically, but last night they refused to work at all. The only way I could get light to drive home by was holding the high beams back like one long flash. No low beam, no high beam. Only "manual" highs. And today it looks like those are dead too. I checked all the fuses they all seem good; I didn't even see a headlight fuse. I found a little box on the driver side strut tower that had three wires marked red brown and black; one of them said head so I pulled it and sorta snugged it back in there, still nothing.
Any help would be great, maybe if you found a quick fix I would be willing to try anything, otherwise its tracing the lights out with my Haynes manual which is going to suck. Until then I'm cruising in the Passat.
Thanks

 

One of my headlights wouldn't work in high beam, so we replaced it and everything's cool now.

 

I take it that your buckets still go up and down? If not it's those wires on the strut tower. They're fusible links, and sometimes they'll go. If your buckets still work then it's bulb contacts. Take the bulb plug off, clean the contacts to your lamps and try again. Check those fuses, sometimes they look good, but are broken in an unclear spot. Just for info, most electrical failures are due to bad grounds....

Best to yuh, Pardner....Look forward to seein' yuh again,
Denny, from the 'ol corncrib....

 

well, the buckets WERE working...after I washed the car today they won't work either. And my power steering went out. So basically this has me absolutely clueless. I'll test the fusible link if I can find out how; time to dig out the crusty old Haynes manual and learn a thing or two about diagnosing electrical problems.

 

I'm puttin money on a combonation switch or conntections to it.

 

combination switch you mean the steering column switch? Thats what I thought.

 

Had the same problem on my 85 when I first got it. It had been sitting for quite a while. Heres what I did to fix mine, pull of the steering wheel and remove the entire combination switch and shroud assembly. Now spray the **** outta it with WD 40 or tuner cleaner. Spray it inside the switch while moving it back and forth, it will probally fix it

 

IF its the combination switch then pull it out and manually clean the connections inside where the headlights switch, they are probly dirty anyway, its a bit tricky sometimes, ive done it myself before and put it back together wrong so take not wot goes where. Altho washing your car might of highlighted an electrical problem along a wire somewhere.

 

Well I spent some time on it today; not much because I'm busy with college and work.
I fixed the fusible link = )

I also removed the wheel and sprayed the entire multiswitch with WD-40. I swear the lights were working for a moment, but then I sprayed more and they don't work now. Also, the steering column started smoking after I sprayed the WD-40. What do you suppose that means?

I'm going to completely remove the switch tomorrow since I'll have more time; and clean it thoroughly with sandpaper and Teflon lubricant. If this doesn't fix it I'll remove the bulbs and clean the contacts. I hope its not something related to the wiring because I doubt I'm up to the task of tracing that out.

My fingers are going numb from holding the brights on all the way home from work.

Did I mention my power steering hose blew? Lots of fun holding lights on with one hand and trying to muscle the car around with the other arm. . .

 

The steering column was probably smoking, because wd-40 is flammable... Disconnect the battery before messing with the electrics that way you won't short anything out..

 

Good news. They started working again today and so far so good. I think the WD40 cleaned the mulitswitch out.

 

Yeah mine smoked too when I did it, its hot contacts and WD 40 getting burnt off..Thats good you got them working...

 

I would remove the combo switch and take it all apart and clean it...clean all of the old dirty grease off of it and use an eraser to clean the copper contacts (works great). Then put some new dielectric grease in there and slap it back together. Make sure that no plastic pieces are broken that would prevent a switch from making contact.

The mound had the same problem but it is all fixed up now.

right on