RED UFO

I just bought my 2003 so I am still learning about my car.

When I turn the switch on the turn signal stalk to the first position (parking lights) my headlights pop up but are not on. My friends 1998 does not do this. His tail and parking lights come on and his headlights stay down. Is there something wrong with mine.

I do have a bad gear in the left motor but I can't see a connection there.

I went on my first cruise with the C5 with my club today so I wanted to turn on my tail and parking lights because we had 20 of us on this trip.

craig04c5

Does it have after-market HID's?

rebelheart

The bad gear is most likely causing your problem.

Toolmandbq

I am a new vett owner and have learned a lot from this site in the past 3 months. When I picked up my 2000 the only real problem it had was with the headlight switch, which seems to be a common problem. I did the switch repair http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c5-t...f-replace.html and saved my self at least $150. My headlights too popped up when I turned on the parking lights. Some say it could be in the gears, but in my case in was in the switch. I believe over time moving the switch fast to headlight postion wears the little parts down inside the switch. Try this it worked for me. Turn the switch real slow until you see the parking lights/fog lights turn on and hopeful the headlights will not pop up. If that worked, your switch has problems. Now I ran around for a day with the switch just in that postion and for some reason now if I just move the switch slowly to the parking light postion every thing works right. I know I will have to replace the switch one of these days, it is not to hard to do. It took me 1 1/2 hours from start to finish. I found the best replacement switch price on Amazon for $144.

RED UFO

As far as I can tell the only thing aftermarket on this car are the floor mats and the deck lid pad.

dougbfresh

Switch would be my 1st guess, if the gears were bad you'd hear them grinding.

rclinton

outside chance, but check that your twilight sentinel is off.

Twilight (Optional in United States,
Standard in Canada)

Press the OPTIONS button until TWILIGHT

button 2 (2 GAGES). Each bar is equal to 12 seconds.

RED UFO

I just went out and tested it. If I turn it really slow and not all the way to the parking light postion just the P-lights come on. If I take it to the parking light position the head lights pop up but the headlights are off.

Blue 92

Sounds like the switch.

RED UFO

The left gear is bad. It grinds for abour 5 seconds after the light closes. I am going to order metal gears.

RED UFO

Is the switch repairable when it does this or is replacing the only option?

Armyboy79

I'd had the same problem 02 that when I turn on the parking lights the buckets came up too. my passenger side light motor made the same grinding sound. I'd replaced the gear in the bad motor and fix the headlight problem now when I turn on my parking lights the buckets stay close.

RED UFO

That is great news. I will change both gears and see what happens. Thank you.

JCamaro

It is definitely the gear. I had the same problem....rotated the gear 90' CCW and reinstall. Now no more issues. Ordered 2 replacement gears for when this happens again.

rebelheart

Pretty much what I said!

mcgilles

replace with brass gears.

my car started doing the same thing. something about worn out gears allowing the motor to still turn or recoil some (more likely) after the door control module thinks the doors are all the way closed. somehow this confuses it and allows the headlight doors to pop open. in the parking lights position there is nither a command up or command down signal going to the module. for some reason when this happens when the signal to keep the doors closed is present the doors stay closed.. when that signal goes away, even with a lack of the command to open them, they pop up unexpectedly. when niether signal to open or close is present the doors are supposed to stay where they are and not move (expected behavior, off -> parking lights, doors stay put in the closed position; headlights -> parking lights doors stay put in the open position but the headlights turn off) the +12V signal to close the doors is supposed to be present whenever the switch is in the off position, even when the car is turned off. and obviously the wire commanding the doors to open is +12V anytime the headlights or highbeams are on.

replacing the gear fixed it.

one word of warning though, for some bizzarre reason on my car the headlight symptoms were still present after I replaced my gear. no one on the forum or the guy who sells the gears had ever seen it before or knew what the problem was. about 2 weeks after I replaced the gears the problem suddenly stopped and everything has been fine for 2.5 years or so.

RED UFO

That's right and I thank you for that.

Murcat

I had the same issue. Right headlight motor assembly grinding after light assembly goes down. A few days later the headlights started popping up when I turned the switch to parking lights only.

I replaced the gear motor plastic gear with the brass replacement available from many vendors - I used Top-Down Solutions’ kit. On my first test of the rebuilt system, the lights move as they are supposed to - up only when the switch is in the headlight mode and back down when the switch turned off. The motor is much quieter also.