Nearside Pod Motor

[rarecarfan]

So the FHC is really trying my patience and a "wink "from her is not exactly helping! However a challenge is a challenge, onwards and upwards etc.........The nearside pod has become erratic at best and prefers to "sleep in" the offside works fine and I have swapped all the relays over etc and the problem stays on the nearside, have also checked voltages at the pod connections after disconnecting them and all seem ok. Have even tried the nearside lift motor in the offside harness and it still doesn't work. A bit loathed to swap the offside motor into the nearside harness, think I would rather source a new pod motor.

So my questions are!

are Pod motors handed (don't believe that they are but worth a check from you guys)?

What experience has anyone had getting recon pod motors from either Rimmers or Robsport?

If there is anyone in the North Devon area who has a spare pod motor would like to hear from you and "bribe" with beer tokens etc!

Cheers in anticipation
Tim

[Dire Grammes]

Much work has been put into this followng page to help the likes of yourself solve pop-up problems

Don't miss the sentence lower down the page that reads "You can see a stripdown of the pod motors here....", the word "here" is a clickable link to a Powerpoint file that you can open online if you don't have Powerpoint

This is a great tutorial with quality diagrams, I take my hat off to the creator of this page

http://www.wedgeneering.co.uk/TVR%20390SE%20p6.htm

[rarecarfan]

I should have said that I had already looked at and absorbed previous posts etc and have worked through the motor strip down without any success.

[adam quantrill]

Have you tried the simple one - leave it soaking in a bucket of oil for a month?

[RCK974X]

Have you tried checking the wiring ? My DHC has a stack of connectors right behind the RHS (driver) pod motor, and they were all very green and corroded.

A good clean made lot of difference to horn, instruments, etc.... A PITA to get at (remove whole pod) but worth doing I reckon.

This is the kind of thing where a multimeter can speed up diagnosis a LOT. They are cheap and worth it.

They are NOT handed.

[mrzigazaga]

rarecarfan said:

are Pod motors handed

Hi Tim
If you are looking from the front then the right will be the right handed ...Left will be left handed...However if you are sitting in the car then the right handed will be the left handed and the left handed will be the right handed...however if you are working under the car then the left handed which was the right handed will now be the right handed upside down...and the......(sorry couldn't resist)

Have you cleaned up the connections?...I do believe that the 280i has the main feed to the O/S and a link to the N/S...or at least it was on mine...

Also if you haven't already clean up all the earth points, especially the one on the N/S suspension turret...

Ziga

[Dire Grammes]

There is no point in checking the voltages at the pop-up while it is disconnected, multimeter testing can only be carried out when the circuit to be tested is connected and the wires being tested are under their normal operational load, testing disconnected wires in a circuit will show readings on a multimeter that could be very different when connected, this situation is caused by the fact that there is no current flowing through the wires when disconnected hence voltages can show up as ok yet show up as much lower when under load if faulty

[RCK974X]

Not true........

Voltages - sure. But you can check RESISTANCE from fuse box to end connection to check if circuit is good even when wire is not connected.
It should be less than 0.1 ohms. Any decent multimeter should be capable of that. This is good way to check dodgy connectors.

Agree ....

The final check *should* be all connected up, as a double check, to show if there's any voltage drop along the wires (earths also).
Many people don't think to check ALONG THE SAME WIRE for voltage drop, when device is working (drawing current, as you say).
this is in addition to supply across the item (+ to earth)
Use battery + or - terminal as reference point for wire check.

[rarecarfan]

Sussed it! Nothing worse than not being able to identify a failure mechanism because it leaves doubt as to all the previous fault finding!

The top plastic pin/plunger sticks in the housing on the top plastic cover of the motor, consequently when the motor has driven the pod to the down position the electrical contact on the flexi copper strip within the motor stays "broken". on closer inspection the plastic pin that makes/breaks the connection is deformed, is not straight and has a "flat" on one side. Have greased up the plunger/housing sides and can now get the motor to work albeit the plunger still sticks occasionally but now a "tap" releases it. Obviously this is not a permanent fix so am going for a new/recon motor. However I can now do that with reasonable confidence!

Will also drill a hole so i CAN GET TO THE MANUAL RAISE/LOWER, my car has no such aperture hence the difficulty getting the pod up in the first instance! Will also drill a hole on the offside.......I mean after all it is a TVR with pods!

Cheers for all the constructive advice and hopefully my "troubles" will give another owner a head start on what may be an issue if their pods "hibernate"!