Out driving last night, and my driver's side headlight wouldn't go up when I pulled the headlight switch so I had to manually crank it up with the thumbwheel on the back of the headlight motor. But to my surprise, it went back down by itself when I turned the headlights off.

Is this an issue with the relay, the motor, or something else?

I rarely drive at night, but prior to this the headlight on that side used to wink (go up and down twice) when I turned the headlights on. Not sure if that was a related issue.

The motor only spins in one direction so if it goes down, the motor is good.

That's good to know! I'm guessing maybe an issue with the relay then. Someone once told me that the winking was due to a bad relay, but I thought it gave the car character so I never did anything about. Maybe it finally failed. I'll put it on the test bench and see if it activates or not.

Mine does the same thing (winks) and I also like the character it adds (which I find amusing). A complete failure is less amusing, however. Let us know what you find.

The relay powers the motor; if the motor spins then the relay is likely good.

The headlight switch might have a problem, or the wiring from the switch to the headlight motor assemblies. Or maybe even one of the microswitches inside the assembly which say that the light is up or down.

--DD

My Winking was cured with all the grounds being cleaned. Never hurts to try. Might be why they didn't go up. I took off the wires and it was gray under there, not bright metal

Hope that helps

I had problems like that - turned out my wiring was melted thru in various spots between the fuses and the headlight motors.

Replacing the wiring fixed it.

Scott - I think I had similar issue when mice got a wire or 2. Right?

So I cleaned the grounds at the headlight. Nothing.
Then I cleaned the three contacts in the multi-pin plug. Bingo!

EZ PZ fix. Headlight works perfectly, although sadly it no longer winks. But I'm very glad I didn't have to replace any parts!

my old car used to wink. I liked it. Maybe we could developed a mod to do it if we want.

The easiest way would be to splice in an additional spst switch into the wire that goes from the relay coil to ground. Then you could control the winking, and do it anytime you wanted to without the headlight turning off.
Add a switch for each side, and then you could control both of them independently.

Right - just where the wires went through the firewall they were melted / eaten and were intermittently touching other things.

I love happy endings!