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Headlight switch: 170* f after 15 min. on?

my2monkeys

my2monkeys

NAXJA Member
Location
Mission Viejo, CA
My tail lamps, inst. Illumination quit working. So I wrangle that headlight switch out. The connector is melted at the B2 terminal.

So I clean switch and spade connectors best I can. Ohm out the

switch, I was able to get the B2 and R terminals to read close to 0 ohms.

Drove today with the switch accessible to monitor any problems and noticed how hot that sucker gets.
1989 4.0 auto
Laser thermometer says 170*f. Is that what it always runs at?
 
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Do you have higher wattage headlamps in there? If so that's yoru issue. If not you likely have poor connections in between the switch and lamp that are causing a resistance building and over-powering your switch.

I would correct it by cleaning all the connectors and building or buying a good headlamp harness that pulls fused power direct from the battery. Then all your headlamp switch is driving is the trigger wire of the relay taking the majority of the load off of it.
 
Um, that's pretty hot. I'd be worried about running it.
most of us have had the headlight switch try to melt. I added a aftermarket headlight harness to help take the load off the main wiring .

To fix it the melted plug I bought a headlight switch plug harness I think for a 92-96 xj, it has extra part to the plug the 84-91 does not have, Dremel the extra bit off and it's wire by wire the same plug.
Of course you might be able to fabricate your own solution .



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Ok guys, thanks for the info.

Also the blue illumination relay thats taped up by the kick panel gets warm to hot when the switch is on.

I didnt think that current flowed thru a relay in a manner that should heat it up.

I see the headligt switch is housed in bake o lite or porcelain or a similar heat obsorbing material. So some heat is expected apparently.

So I will check and clean the connections at the bulbs and in the circuit accordingly.
 
Here is what I did for the melted/melting headlight switch. I can't remember if the notes on what the each terminal did were my own or if somebody sent them to me.

Green Mesa XJ said:
Biggest problem I had was finding a new connecting plug, 1991 is the last year of the old design and it's 21 years ago now.

I bought a Airtex 1p1190 Pigtail assembly, it's not for a 1984 - 1991 XJ but if you look at you see it almost Identical to the 1991 connector.

Except for two things they added three wires, two of them (Black and Blue) are at the back of the connect and because of them the connector will not fit out of the box.
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What I did was hacksaw off those two addition connectors, you can see where it was added to the old design. With those gone the plug now fits the 1984 - 1991 XJ headlight switch no problem.

They did add a wire to the plug that isn't used, terminal P, I believe. I just pulled the unneeded wire.


These are from some notes I made, could be slight off, it was about a week or two ago I did the rewiring.

1984 -1991 Cherokee XJ headlight terminals

I - Instrument Cluster / Dash Lights
D - Ground for Dome
H - Headlights
B2 - Taillights / Park lights
R - Dimmer switch
P- Unused
B1 - to Battery input from fuse box
Click to expand...

After the headlight switch was fixed I installed a Putco 230004HW Lighting Wiring kit, not highest quality but for the money it's not bad.
Click to expand...
 
my2monkeys said:
Ok guys, thanks for the info.

Also the blue illumination relay thats taped up by the kick panel gets warm to hot when the switch is on.

I didnt think that current flowed thru a relay in a manner that should heat it up.

I see the headligt switch is housed in bake o lite or porcelain or a similar heat obsorbing material. So some heat is expected apparently.

So I will check and clean the connections at the bulbs and in the circuit accordingly.
Click to expand...
Is this a new switch?
 
I've had that happen twice, once it was a shorted variable (dimmer) resistor in the headlight switch. The second time it was the wire in the harness from the Park Light fuse to the headlight dimmer. I think the shorted dimmer resistor in the headlight switch caused the wire meltdown in the harness, heat travels. I eventually just ran a new wire up bypassing the melted wire in the harness.

One guy had a similar issue it turned out to be his clock.

The metal rod for the headlight switch knob got so hot it put a blister on my finger tip.
 
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