Hello everyone, long time snooper / first time poster. I just picked up a 1998 Ram 1500 Quad Cab 4x4 and I've been fixing up some of the issues it has. I'm pretty much done with the big body and exhaust things, but now I'm tracking down some electrical issues.

When I first got the truck, the power door locks would not work from either switch and only the drivers side window would go up and down. On Monday I replaced the door lock actuators in each door and the locks started working, going both up and down. I removed the passenger side window motor and found out that the motor would work, but only to put the window up. It would not work to come down. I had a spare window motor and put it in and it did the same thing. It would go up, but not down. I had a spare set of controls for the door panels and swapped them out, but it was the same story.

On Tuesday I was working on some other things on the truck and noticed that the door locks would only lock, but not unlock. I still had a lot to do on other parts of the truck, so I just figured I would look into it later. I did notice that the high mount brake light would not work as well as the courtesy lights. I put new bulbs in, but it was a no go. I have not pulled the assembly fully out to check the wiring connections, but I did go through all the fuses and they all looked ok.

On Wednesday I was finishing up misc. things on the truck and at the end of the day I had a bed full of junk that I needed to throw away. There is a large dumpster at my work, so I figured I would take it all there and throw it out and have a chance to test out how the truck rode and drove after all my hard work. When I got in, I wanted to put my window down to enjoy the breeze, but accidentally hit the passenger button and the window went down! I tried it up and down and it worked like a charm. The lock buttons still only worked to lock the locks though, not unlock. I decided to roll the window up and not test my luck, but it wound up stopping halfway up! When I got to the dumpster, I pulled up on the window and the motor was working and it went up all the way. I took it home and called it a night.

Today I went outside to put some stuff in the glove box and the power door locks were working 100% again! My passenger side window would not budge though. About 10 minutes later the door locks went back to just locking, not unlocking. WTF.... I'm thinking it's a loose ground connection. Can anyone give me an idea of where to find the grounds to these systems? Does anyone have any ideas of what else it could be? The intermittent nature of the symptoms lead me to believe that it is a loose ground wire or two, but I'm open to other suggestions! Thanks!

 

My truck is kinda random like that too..... seems the connectors on the switches corrode a bit, and you get random behavior. Even replacing the switches didn't help.... However, if I press the switch and connectors together, things start working again. (the door pull isn't screwed in, so, I can take it out, and get to both top and bottom of the switches.)

If your window will go down fine, but stalls going up, and will then go up later, with help, need a new motor. They get old and tired, and that is the symptoms you see before they fail completely. Might be able to tear down the motor, clean and lube it up good, and get some more service out of it. As you have a spare, give it a shot.

Also, if you don't have one already, you can download a copy of the service manual from this thread. Very handy to have.

Welcome to DF!

 

Have you had the dash out doing HVAC work? The steel frame where it bolts to the body behind the kick panels IS a major ground path. Sometimes people leave the big bolt loose on either or both sides.

 

I thought that as well, so I tried two extra motors (I had a parts truck to pull from) and they did the same thing. They would only go up, not down. It's weird.

Thanks! I'll start combing through that tonight! I have them for my F-Bodies and they have been a life saver!

Thank you!


I have not, but I don't know if the previous owner did. I'll definitely check though and make sure they are snug! Thanks!

 

Ok, so a little update and another question for y'all. I have the third brake light issue solved. The gasket that surrounds the lens was completely gone and the connectors were corroded. I found another one at the pick-n-pull, put fresh bulbs in it, and it's working like a charm! I was a bit confused about cargo lights not coming on when I opened my door, but that's because Dodge apparently does something different than what I'm used to. I used to own a 99 F-150 and my dad currently owns a 2008 F-150 and the cargo lights are tied to the interior dome lights. They come on when you open the doors, whereas my Dodge's cargo lights only come on when I turn them on via the headlight switch. My bad, haha!

Now for my door lock / window issue. I've been searching through the service manual and found that the grounds for these are through G300 and G301. I have included a picture below from the manual:



I found G301 easily and it's all tight. I tested it and it works perfectly as a ground.



Now, I didn't see G300 like the manual said I would. I followed the wire bundle down from G301 and it started to go along the side of the cab heading towards the dash by the seats. I did see two connections that look like they might be grounds. One looks fine and the other is severely corroded:

The good looking one:


The one that is corroded. No, it's not rust, haha! That's all dirt that has been turned into mud with all the rain we've been having:


Are these grounds? At first I thought they were there to secure the wiring harness, but these two look different then others that are further up. These are integrated into the wiring harness, whereas further up there are little hoops that hold the wiring harness in place. I was going to splice the tape and see what they were connected to, but it started to rain pretty hard so I called it a night. Any ideas anyone?

 

So during lunch I took a break from my office and ran back to the house to check those metal connectors and they are not grounds. I did spot another large ground connection on the lower driver side kick panel and I'm going to check it out tonight when I get home. There are like five or six connections that run to it, so I'll have to spend some time going over it and testing everything. Hopefully it fixes my issue!

 

Let us know what ya find.

 

Will do! I think I have it figured out. After work I'm going to try my fix and see what happens. I'll update with more info and pictures later on tonight!

 

Ok, I got it all fixed up! This is the factory ground connection:



All five grounds slip onto a blade type connector and it is bolted to the frame. I cut the grounds off of that connector and took the two largest wires, twisted them together, and secured them to a connector. The other three wires were fairly small and I secured them to three individual connectors.



I took the large connector with the two thicker ground wires and used the factory bolt to secure it to the frame. The other three I grouped together and drilled a hole in the frame to secure them to.



Since this picture, I replaced the sheet metal screw with a bolt that has an 8mm socket head on it so I could secure it more properly. I also adjusted the angle of the large connector so it wasn't so tweaked. Everything works like it should now! Now I just need to finish redoing the headliner and get some new tires and she'll be ready to roll!

 

Awesome.