01 cavalier, No headlights, wipers and drivers door lock

[Barberryn]

I have a problem as title suggests. When working, all is OK. When not, I have no high or low beams, a weak and barely moving wipers with a lot of buzzing comming from wiper motor area and drivers door lock trys to lock (or at least the lock sound is comming from drivers door). The DRL's function normally. The problems are definetly interlinked and it is very intermittant and can come and go several times in a few minutes.
After hours of searching this forum I have found others with the same problem so know I am not alone. Unfortunatly, the other posts offered no solution.
Has anybody found and fixed this glitch and if so How?? Please help.

[J-Ri]

Start by checking for loose/corroded battery cables, they can cause weird electrical stuff.

[Barberryn]

Thanks man, I'll pull and clean up the cables tomorrow. Problem exists randomly with engine running or not so I do not think it will cure my problem - But it is good advice and good maintenance to keep them clean - so TLC the cables and connections will get.

[J-Ri]

Originally Posted by Barberryn

Problem exists randomly with engine running or not so I do not think it will cure my problem.

It may not, but you'd be amazed what bad connections can do. On many Chrysler products, bad cable connections will cause the turn signal to not work but everything else on the car will work fine, and there is no voltage drop across the connection

I had a '98 Grand Am that had the cables loose when I bought it, it did the same wiper and lock thing yours is doing, and would flash dash lights and the headlight brightness would go up and down. Eventually after 3 weeks of not caring enough to find the problem, the car died one morning when I touched the brake pedal and had no electrical power.

[Barberryn]

Well; pulled main ground cable and all engine ground connections that I could find and found all quite clean. Cleaned them up extra nice anyway and all is tight. Pulled main red cables to starter/ fuse panel and cleaned up connections. All tight and as suspected made no improvement to "problem".

Very frustrating. Mostly wipers will work but when lights are "turned on" both the wipers and lights die, wiper motor buzzing starts and door lock solinoids trigger. Does not matter if dry day or raining. Traced all wiring harnesses I can get exposed but can find no rubs or "green" connectors.

[J-Ri]

Check the voltage to the headlights and wiper motor, if less than 12v (ideally no less than .5v of system voltage, but they should be fine with 12v) with both on, check the power distribution circuit that they share. Also check to see if they share a ground.

[highhopesforcars]

Try checking out the switch on the column they all work through that and i have seen on 2 different cavs the wiring in the coulumn a freyed and worn through. Just remeber dont set off the air bags

[Spyder3K]

Yeah, I'd check into the column too. If there's a bad wire in there, it can affect everything that the column has on it. I've seen some crazy things with my own cavi so I'm open to thinking so far out of the box that I'm on top of a refridgerator box to see it. I've had the column switches go on me before and I've had wipers that don't shut off and drl's but no low beams and no cruise, I mean the combinations could be endless, so get checkin' in there.

[Barberryn]

Well, I thought I had it. After a few minutes of engine off troubleshooting, engine failed to start. Turns out I had a weak battery. Once replaced, the problem disappeared. A week later, it's back. While I have removed the lower little cover from the column, I cannot get the top one or main dash apart to really expose the wiring.
Is there a trick to getting started on the dash as I can not find many screws and don't want to break it up pulling in the wrong spots.

P.S. Thanks all for your help so far. Misery loves company!!

[Barberryn]

Well, after Months of suffering with the problem and spending many "nice" days ripping the car apart - searching - through wiring harnesses; my problem has been found and fixed. No, I did not put a match to the car!!

There is a harness connector under the battery support tray. The tray needs to be removed to find it, let alone to work on the little Bastard. It is so cramped and kinked, it was wearing through itself. Once found, and the grounding/shorting wiring repaired and re-insulated, all now works properly.

This was a hard problem to find. The wiper feed was shorting to the head light feed line. When this pulled the voltage down the "body control module" relays would drop out and simulate a door lock command.The intercommunication of supposedly non-related systems made troubleshooting challenging. Hope my long awaited good luck will benefit any others with similar symptoms.

[COP TZR]

front wiring harness issue, very common. GM sells replacement section, loosing high beam is usually a sign of this...

[KowalskiX6]

Hello Barberryn,

I was dealing with the exact same issues for months with my pontiac sunfire. Even the mechanic couldn't find the issue. After finding your post online I went to them with the information and they were able to fix the issue. I definitely appreciate you posting your findings they were VERY helpful!