central locking

[andy523]

i have just bought a '90 325 se and the centarl locking isnt working, any ideas ?

i dont know anything about e30s, just e39s so any help would be appreciated

[daimlerman]

Main relay lives in the front of the driver's side cill,remove the speaker cover and speaker to find it.
Have rumage through the zone wiki,there's a link at the head of each page,and you will find the common faults and fixes.
If these do not work,post here again and we can think harder...

[ProToZyKo]

I would take a look at the A pillar contact, check here.
http://www.e30zone.net/e30zonewiki/inde ... g_problems
On mine the most of it had corroded away, bought some new ones and central locking works again.
Also it's recommended todo red black wire mod, search the forum for that one.
Should be allot of threads about this on the zone.

[Bally]

As above I did mine last week, red black conversion, and the thermal switch needed re welding in central relay , dont use normal solder though

[Bally]

this will help re thermal switch

http://www.e30zone.net/modules.php?name ... ht=locking

[andy523]

thanks all, will check these out

[andy523]

i took out the relay and in the casing was water and the circuit board fried so i got a new relay from a zoner and fitted it tonight, you can hear it clicking but still no central locking.
any other ideas>

[Brianmoooore]

If the locking ECU gets waterlogged, it usually fries all the locking motors as it dies.

[andy523]

so do i need to take the motors out of each door and replace?

[Brianmoooore]

First of all find yourself a 12 volt bulb of at least 5W, attached to two pieces of wire. An E30 sidelamp or indicator repeater bulb and holder are ideal.
Disconnect the locking ECU from its plug, and connect the bulb between the red/black wire and the brown wire. It should light at full brightness.
If all is OK, find two short lengths of wire, fit one between the red/black and white, and fit one end of the other wire into the blue. Momentarily connecting the other end of that wire to the brown, and the locks should lock (or possibly unlock if I've got it the wrong way around).
Connecting the red/black to the blue, and momentarily connecting the white to the brown should unlock them.

[magpie]

his c/l relay was soaked and now has a replacement that clicks but still no c/l.

[andy523]

thats great will check it out over the weekend.

i dont mean to be stupid, i just dont know these sort of things but what does this mean if it work as you say. new actuators, motors etc. i appreciate your patience and advise

[Brianmoooore]

First test is to see if power is reaching the system, and the second test is the first part of a test to check the lock motors.

[andy523]

okay will do this over the weekend and see what happens

[magpie]

best of luck Andy.

Cheers Brian.

[f22raptor1]

ive just dug this up as i have no power at all to the central locking relay/ecu ive tested it with a bulb and its dead and all fuses are fine

[f22raptor1]

and ive done the red/black mod to

[Brianmoooore]

and ive done the red/black mod to

Sure you've done it correctly?

[f22raptor1]

i went by all the descriptions after looking through the tech section 2 off the harness that goes to the door and 1 off the light delay relay..... hope thats right

[Brianmoooore]

What car and age?

[Rav335uk]

If it's a cab, it'll have 3 wires to connect, if a saloon, then 2 wires.

[f22raptor1]

1989 325 cab

[Rav335uk]

Then there'll be 3 Red/Black wires to connect.

[f22raptor1]

yeh ive connected 3 wires mate.... just been haveing probs with the live feeds on this pile of scrap lol........ i tested it with a live off another part and it works....as i said before the guy/idiot who had the car before me realy butcherd the wiring on various things ie windows,stereo,indicators.wipers ive managed to sort most of them... i could run a new fusable live from behind the glove box to the locking ecu as it does work when i did it. i just dont want to do it without a bit of advice first

[Brianmoooore]

Three wires, as above.
Two of the wires should have come from the same pin on the door socket, and go to the locking ECU and the socket for an interior light delay module respectively. The third wire should come from a loom coming from the rear of the car, and is the supply wire. It should have 12 volts+ on it at all times.
The wire goes back the RH sill, across the rear seat pan, all the way over the LH sill and then up through the duct to fuse 27 in the fusebox. There are no plugs and sockets in this wire, although there is a splice inside the loom in the area of the front LH speaker, where another red/black branches off and goes back to the accessories socket.
Check whether there is power at the wire at the accessories socket, which will establish whether power makes it as far as the splice.

[f22raptor1]

brian your a genius i had them wired wrong lol................ just done it temp now and its working fine so ill go get some heat shrink sleeving................ just the window switch live to work out now lol.............. thanks again