s2k2go

Hi,

I put an 02 top on my s2k and now i am trying to get the defroster to work
I am using hardtop defroster parts.
(1) i put the relay in the open position in my fuse block
(2) i put the switch in my center console (where the coin holder was)
(3) i connected the switch to the existing connector in the car under the console
(4) i located the connector behind the drivers seat for the defroster wiring to connect to.
(5) I connected the hard top wiring to the connector in (#4)
first froblem was the connector at the other end of the hardtop wiring has 3 wires on it. (all black, black / red and Black yellow) The defoster wiring what this connects to(the wires coming off the defroster are two black wires)
Also, the problem that i'm having is when i plug the hardtop wiring into the connector in the car behind the seat, (even with nothing connected to the other end of this harness) the top will not go up or down . The second i disconnect this harness from that plug the top works again.
So (1) is this normal (ie that the 3 wires on the other end of this harness must be connected for the top to work. (2) what do i do with these 3 wires (their are only two to connect to) again the 3 wires i don't know what to do with are on the end of the hardtop wiring harness and they are black, black / red and black / yellow.)

PLease help

Thanks

tom

E White

It is my understanding that the defroster wiring for the hardtop installation includes a defeat function to prevent the inadvertant activation of the soft top mechanism when the hardtop is in place.

You may have to get one of the supplemental hardtop wiring kits from Hardtopguy specific to the various years that addresses the differences between the years that had soft top defrosters (glass windows)and those that didn't.

Talk to Jeff ...

Halo

Resurrecting this thread in case someone has figure out the wiring and is willing to help out.

As the original post states, if you connect up the harnesses designed for the hardtop defroster, the soft top motor is disabled. This makes sense, as the connected hardtop wiring is telling the car that a hardtop is installed, so the car doesn't want the soft top to accidentally get activated. We, who have swapped in a 02+ top on our 00-01s need to bypass this 'feature.'

I have read over and over again the very excellent instructions here:
http://home.covad.net/~floydmah/defroster.html

However, these deal in depth in how to use a MY02+ dash switch and how to wire a relay so you can have the defroster work if you have BOTH a hard top and soft top. I have no plans for a hardtop, and don't want to bother rebuilding the dash switch) Near the end, there is a statement:
I assume this is the connection I need to make to allow my top motor to continue to work with the harness plugged in.

My question is: connect which wire to which wire on which harness?

I did try to email the link at the bottom of his page and got no response.

Thx.

fmah

Hi. Didn't realize that I could still read that website, thought I lost the data completely when my computer crashed a while back. Thanks for finding it. I still have to try to reconstruct my original understanding of the wiring, but the only part of the stock hardtop wiring harness that had any bearing on the convertible top operation was the two connector plug that comes out of the harness. It consists, as you can see in one of the diagrams, of a black ground wire and a green sensor wire for the convertible top control module. In operation, when the hardtop is installed, it depresses a switch in the catcher which closes the connection between the green wire and the black wire. Ordinarily, when you hook up the wiring harness, without connecting the two wire plug, the green wire is not grounded. It cannot tell if you have a hardtop on at all. Once the hardtop is on and you also have the two wire plug installed, you are telling the convertible top control module that you have a hardtop.
In the following, I am assuming that you don't have a hardtop, or the two wire plug (black and green wires) is not plugged into the hardtop catcher. For your car to refuse to raise the top, while you have the harness installed, means that somehow you have the green wire grounded. You could verify this by checking for continuity between the two connectors in the plug with an ohmmeter or between the green wire and any good ground. If you check the Helm's manual, that is one of the tests of the hardtop wiring harness. As an aside, apparently the very early '00 harness required an extra wire to provide a ground, as it was not built into the hardtop harness, so that could be the source of a different problem. If you find it grounded, disconnect the console end of the harness, (the five conductor green plug) and see if it remains shorted, i.e. a continuity between the two wires in the small plug. This would mean that the harness is defective, or possibly it's one of the harnesses for the earliest '00, which handled the ground connection differently.
If you check at the very bottom of the webpage you referenced, I mentioned that you could dispense with the expense of part of the hardtop harness if you understand that the plug in the console supplies a ground (goes to ground), a yellow-black wire (negative side of grid, and also to ground), and a red-black wire (positive side of grid). If you run, via a intermediary wire, these connections to the softtop grid, you wouldn't even need the hardtop harness. This would apply to a softtop only application. The hardtop grid, which the harness was intended for, required three wires because of the grid connections(two wires) and then the third black wire went to a grounding point. In operation, the yellow-black wire was tied electrically to ground, so if you elect to use this option, you would connect the yellow-black wire to the black wire and run that out to the grid. The red-black wire would go to the grid to supply the +12 volts. Whatever you do, don't connect the red-black wire to ground, or you'll be blowing fuses or worse.
Anyway, I hope this helped. If you study the diagrams on my old webpage, you will see how to make the connections. I followed the color coding of the stock wiring. The boxed areas on the diagrams refer to the wiring inside the harnesses (stock and modified). I did make one of the modified harnesses for someone, and it appeared to function well. I use the two wire modification mentioned at the bottom, since I did not plan to buy a hardtop. It's been working fine. I also made the circuit which used the factory switch, unmodified. I might be able to email anyone a circuit board layout if they can use it. It was a lot of trouble to make the circuit board, but you can do it with a steam iron, a laser printer and some small drills. I personally use a modified factory dash switch and found it worked well.

Halo

Thanks for the update. That is exactly the information I needed.