Hi,

Last week I bought a MkIV 6N with a few faults, I've sorted a couple already (new oil filter, new tyres, new wing mirror etc) but I'm left with some electrical problems.

My passenger side electric windows doesn't wind up OR down. It makes an odd noise, somewhere between crunching and grinding. It still appears to be trying to wind up or down but the window glass doesn't move at all. I have absolutely NO idea what this could be as a lot of the descriptions I've seen on window faults don't seem to match this?

I also seem to be having problems with the battery draining (however I am not 100% on this) at various points. When we went to view the car, the battery was flat as it hadn't been driven for 2 weeks, and we had to jump start it to test-drive/drive away. The morning after we got it back, the battery was flat again so we charged it up. It was then okay for a week, I've driven it a couple of times and it seemed to be fine but last night my girlfriend's mum was driving it (I'm still on a provisional licence) and she left it idling with the radio on for a few minutes and it went dead. We had to go out and jump-start it again. This morning it was fine and it started first time, I've driven it a few times today and started/stopped first time every time.

I charged the battery earlier in the day and it was instantly registering full. I had also noticed that the rear-window switch was left on, but the rear winder heater doesn't seem to work. But I'm sure that if the switch is on then power would still be going to the window, right? And could that then have been what drained the battery?

Cheers!

First Welcome to the forum.

The window could be either the gear on the motor is not meshing correctly with the winder gear, the cable has slipped off the guides or there are plastic clips that hold the sliders onto the main mechanism that are known to fail. You'll need to get the door card off and have a look.

There shouldn't be any power going to the rear screen once the ignition is off, so leaving the switch in the ON position wouldn't have any effect.

I would start by checking all the connections to the battery, starter motor and the alternator and the main earthing cables from the engine to the body, then with it running check the voltage at the battery, it should be around 14 volts, if that all checks OK then have the battery tested, you might have one of the cells in the battery not holding a good charge

First Welcome to the forum.

The window could be either the gear on the motor is not meshing correctly with the winder gear, the cable has slipped off the guides or there are plastic clips that hold the sliders onto the main mechanism that are known to fail. You'll need to get the door card off and have a look.

There shouldn't be any power going to the rear screen once the ignition is off, so leaving the switch in the ON position wouldn't have any effect.

I would start by checking all the connections to the battery, starter motor and the alternator and the main earthing cables from the engine to the body, then with it running check the voltage at the battery, it should be around 14 volts, if that all checks OK then have the battery tested, you might have one of the cells in the battery not holding a good charge

Thank you, I imagine I'll be posting a fair bit! Bit of a newbie to all of this, first car and all. :)

I'll get the door card off soon and have a look, that's really the last priority.

The window switch was left on while the car was running, and again while the car was idling for 10 minutes. Not sure if that would affect it. I don't have a multimeter or anything so I'm unsure as to how I can check the voltage and/or the drain, so I guess I'll just have to be patient.

Thank you for your reply, I'll check those things.

We were all first time car owners at some time, (in my case a long time ago, late1970's) so don't be afraid to ask questions :)

If the alternator isn't charging properly, then the high current drain from the rear screen heater would affect how much power was put back into the battery.

You can get a multimeter from the likes of Maplins for around a tenner you'll find it very useful for fault finding

How can I check to see if the alternator is functioning correctly?

I plan to get a multimeter fairly soon! Got a few other small issues to sort along the lines of cracked number plates and wheel arch rust.

Other than small things she's a goodittle car :)

I've just put a guide to testing an alternator at the start of this section