ghostdive

Hello, I recently bought this car and after I got home I noticed that the roof was tilted open. Switch didn't close it, so I checked and the motor was unplugged.

​​​​​Motor worked but struggled and wouldn't stay closed. Removed, cleaned some caked grease, tried again. Took out glass and cleaned rails and some of the worm drive. Also adjusted the cables to be in sync, as the roof was drooping on one side.

So, it opens fully now with no struggle or issues. When I close the roof, it goes past the "closed" position and stops with the roof fully tilted. The tilt up function makes a brief noise but doesn't move the roof up more - the tilt down function does nothing.

For now, I timed shutting the car off to have the roof closed, then unplugged the motor again. I'd like to have the roof working again though.

Is this issue in the motor, or the circuit board? If I fully tilt the roof up, then remove the motor and cycle it to "tilt up" and reinstall it, might that fix the issue? I'm unsure how it determines the points at which to stop.

dwoods801

Not a common problem on your model car. Have you considered buying a shop manual for your vehicle. It’s going to have all the manufacturers diagnostic procedures. So you’ll find it very helpful, even if you don’t plan to do the repairs yourself. Any problems that arise, you’ll be able to find out how to diagnose them and what the repairs will likely involve. So you can decide if it’s worth trying to repair yourself or if you should take it to a shop. You will also know what a competent repair shop is going to do to diagnose and repair your problem. And you can avoid having a shop just start throwing parts at your problem and running up repair bills that aren’t appropriate for the situation.
Unfortunately sharing photos from the manual online can be a violation of copyright laws. So it’s difficult to get someone to share them on this forum anymore. But search around on eBay and you’ll find plenty of manuals available or you can get a subscription to AllData if you just want to get temporary access to a digital manual.

ghostdive

Thank you for the reply! I'm sorry for not responding sooner but I was waiting until I did more troubleshooting. I have fixed it.

I believe someone had tried to fix the roof earlier - it was very gummed with dirt/old grease - and got both the motor and the cables out of sync.

The cables I synchronized by getting the roof tilted open, removing the motor and glass, then pulling the cables with my fingers until both sunroof "arms" were at the same fully open angle.

To synchronize the motor, I opened the roof fully (I believe there are stop points on the cables, the grooves seem to be filled with some type of composite); I then unbolted and removed the motor from its mount, leaving it plugged in. I cycled it forward, then backward again, and reinstalled.

The motor now closes at the correct position and the tilt function works as well. I believe that there's a sensor inside the sunroof motor which counts the turns of the gear, and it was out of sync with the roof position. I hope this solution helps someone down the line - maybe if a used replacement doesn't sync up.