Etacs or other relay???

[Pearl94GT]

95 MTX 156k SL -->

One morning, the car had minor power on startup. I thought, that's kind of wierd, but no problem.

Parked the car, left thinking the car had turned the lights off automically(normal operation when you leave the car)

The car was dead when I returned(2 hrs) and a neighbor said the lights were on while I was gone. When I tried to start the car There was enough power to get interior lights on and the etacs would buzz and then click when power was nil. I noticed the headlights were on as well.

Jumped the car and it started fine. Disconnected the battery when parked knowing it would be drained if I left it hooked up.

Now that I know there is a problem, if you turn the lights on, they stay on regardless if the key is in or not.

The car runs fine when started and voltage at 13. Problem is, the battery is getting drained when parked.

Does this sound like I need a new etacs, headlight relay... what do you think is wrong if the headlights stay on when there is no key in the ignition.

Thanks...

[Stealthee]

The headlight shut of function is on its own relay.

Chances are the relay is fine and you just need to clean your door switch.

[quackmandude]

yea i had that problem and it was the driver side door switch...give it a look see
SAMSUNG-SGH-I617/1.0 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile 7.6)

[Pearl94GT]

Yeah, I read your posts on doing this, checked the operation, and the I noticed the switch is working at about 75% reliability.

If the door is open, the red light will go on 3/4 times. If I manually press the switch on/off the light will respond better. So I think this is part of the problem.

Just to be clear, I will remove the switch and clean it.

But... if I turn the headlights on with no key and while this switch is operated and functioning, the headlights remain on. So it leads me to believe it is something else.

I will get my alt/start checked at autozone to see if it might be the alt.

Thanks for the help and I will do the above and post results.

[Stealthee]

The headlight shut off relay is located behind the drivers side rear speaker cover. It takes some work to get to as you have to remove the rear seat and then a few random screws and bolts to remove the cover. There is testing procedures in the manual.