1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

[Richard M.]

Wiring a new engine harness today, I removed the motor brackets to fish the harness above and in front of the motors. What do you think happened? Besides hearing a loud expletive when I discovered it.

Hints....Views from inside engine bay looking forward. This is a red car.
Driver side


Pass side


This will also cause another malfunction. It's observed from the driver seat when the lights go on and up. Hint, the prior harness wasn't connected to the telltale switches.

If you give up, scroll down and find the reason and see what it should look like......
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When I loosened the motor brackets from the header reinforcements, both buckets rotated from the weight of the motors and tried to open partially. I was stumped at first, then it hit me......

It has it's inner bucket pivot housings reversed. As you can see, the rods for the motor capture bracket are in the opposite location, facing forward. They should face rearward for the motor bracket to capture it. If the wires were connected for the dash Telltale LIGHTS lamp, it would work in reverse, meaning when the lights are on and buckets raised completely, the LIGHTS lamp will light up. With the buckets down, the lamp would go off. This car has been like this for at least 16 years. Now everything has to come apart to make it right.


Black car, correctly mounted. The inner pivot housings are seen best in the first 2 photos.


Rich

[John M.]

Re: 1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

Rich,
The motors look correct but the bracket and Y stop look wrong. Switched left to right? Those bolts are not that easy to get at.
John

[Jimmy B.]

Re: 1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

did the ear of the inner cup break/crack around the mounting bolt? if it did and you need a used one lmk

[Richard M.]

Re: 1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

Someone simply reversed the inner housings last time they were installed. I don't think anything is broken or cracked. The housings can be installed on either side as the 3 threaded corners for the attaching bolts are identically oriented in a triangle, i.e. ambidextrous. But if reversed, the motors still work and buckets operate okay, but the motors aren't properly captured in the brackets to the housings.

Here's a better picture of a normal installation. Note where the telltale switches are mounted, up high, and note the locating rod for the slot in the motor bracket. The little clothespin clips go on the ends of the rods.

Driver side


Pass side


This is the 2nd time I've seen this mis-installation oddity. The first one took me a while to figure out, on wife's 63 coupe. The motors and buckets worked fine, but the telltale LIGHTS lamp on the dash always worked in reverse from normal.

Here are some better shots of the pivots. Note they're marked LH and RH.


I mainly wanted to post this oddity in case others have their buckets apart and a heads-up to not install the pivots reversed.

Rich

[Loren L.]

Re: 1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

interesting, as always, Rich. Especially when it wakens Blakely from a comatose state to offer parts.

[Richard M.]

Re: 1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

Yes Loren, I always seem to get these "interesting" things.....constantly being tested I guess.

Jimmy's welcome to come over and help me fix it. He's not to far from me. We've spent hours on the phone having fun stories to share.

I'm diving in to pull it all apart right now. Time me. I bet it'll be a few hours, barring any other unforeseen issues along the way.

Rich

[Richard M.]

Re: 1966 Headlight Bucket Quiz

Well it took a while but it's fixed. I had to pull the inner bulbs to remove the housings and had to fix a few other gotchas, like bezel screws that sawed themselves out of the lower tabs, and repair the headlight extension harnesses that were corroded and one terminal needed to be replaced. I also cleaned and tested the telltale switches. It took about 2 hours total. I then finished the wiring using the new engine and forward harness. All done.

Here you can see the motor brackets now being captured by the locating rods. I need to get 2 clips for those rods.


Then I finished installing the new rear harness. I got to the licence lamp and found this....It never ends.