Micro Switch Riddle
There is something that has been bothering me about my ZJ from day one. We, for some reason, have not ever been able to open the rear glass on the rear hatch. There was some sort of electrical drama keeping it from functioning. I brought the Jeep into Temecula to see an old friend at Audio Evolution. These guys not only do some incredible stereo work, but they are also masters at tracking down gremlins in the wiring system. He belongs to a website that he can get specific wiring diagrams for every vehicle ever made. He looked up the specific model ZJ I have and had the complete schematic printed and on hand for the inspection. I removed the rear panel from the hatch and stripped off the rubber sheet to get access to the wiring harness. He brought out a high tech polarity tester and started testing the function of every solenoid and switch in the rear system. We narrowed the problem down to a little tiny micro switch. This switch is what tells the hatch that the doors are unlocked and that it is ok for the rear glass switch to work.
I went over to the Jeep dealership and was promptly informed that the micro switch I was in need of was going to cost me a cool $120. After discovering that the $120 switch did not include a little private dance time with a struggling college girl with daddy issues, I elected to pass on the purchase. I received a call about a week later fom Audio Evolution stating that they had come up on an extra micro switch that I could have to repair it myself. I stopped by and picked up the new switch
I immediately rolled home and ripped into the hatch
The switch itself is located on the door handle mechanism
After a little fiddling around I managed to get the door handle out of the rear hatch and on to the bench
Here is the back side of it with this little gold plated diamond studded micro switch with 2 wires and a plug
As you can see the switch I have to replace it with is quite different
That means I need to make my own bracket to hold the new switch in place. I decided to make it out of some .063 sheet metal. The plan was to make the switching happen in the same location with the new switch just mounted in the necessary location to make thsat happen.
I started by measuring and cutting a rectangle
I wanted it to mount in the same location, so I transfered the hole locations
I then bent the bracket like the original bracket
Now I just had to mark the locations of the holes on the new switch and bolt it in. This was drama because I didnt feel like doing crazy perfect measurements and didn't have a small enough ink pen to mark the holes, so I busted out an old trick. I spray painted black into a towel and dipped the opposite end of a drill bit in the paint, then used it as a marker
It worked perfectly!
The last step was to drill the holes and prepare for mounting
