Circuit breakers - amperage

[Rick]

Hi, I’m new to the forum as well as new to retractables. Living in Germany I bought a ‘59 Skyliner a few months ago in the US which arrived with me 2 weeks ago. While the roof worked ok before I bought it trouble started when I first tried it out. The roof retracted ok and on reerecting the roof locking motors didn’t stop running (as long as I operated the switch) and the tray and deck lid didn’t close.

After some reading of the shop manual I learned that one (or some) of the roof position switches must have been misadjusted. I uninstalled the rear bench to get access to the relays and powered the roof unlocking relay with the help of a cable. The rear roof locking motor worked and lifted the rear of the roof by an inch, but the front motor didn’t work.

Two possibilities now. Either the motor’s gone south or the circuit breaker has disengaged permanently. This results in me having to manually raise the roof, which procedure is described in the shop manual. Since I’d like to be prepared with spare parts I’d appreciate if someone could provide me with the amperage of all circuit breakers linked to the retractable motors and a source where to buy them.

I know there’s one circuit breaker in line between where the current flows into the retractable system and the neutral switch, rated at 45 amps. This circuit breaker is located under the dash on the driver’s side. There are 6 more circuit breakers involved in the system, linked into the ground line of each of the 6 motors operating the retractable system. The shop manual doesn’t list the amperage of the 6 circuit breakers in the ground lines and I don’t know where to get the values from.

Maybe one of you more knowledgables can help me.

Thanks!

[Rick]

After watching one of Nick Keilen’s wonderful videos it seems to me that the amperage of all other circuit breakers is 10 amps, except the one for the roof motor, which is 20 amps. If someone comes up with other values, I’d like to take note of them.

Today I investigated further on the roof not working properly. I powered the roof locking relay and I heard something clicking in the rear of the car and the rear roof locking motor tried to turn over. I took the two flexible drive shafts off the motor because I thought they were binding, but that didn’t change anything. Then I powered the motor directly, not using the relay, and it turned over normally.

Bottom line, something on the way to the front roof locking motor is drawing much current. Either the motor has a defect, the harness is ‘leaking’ or the locking nut(s) are binding. I measured the circuit breaker of the front roof locking motor which showed only very little resistance, meaning it is ok.

Stay tuned, I’ll let you know what I find out.

[Fnixon]

Welcome to the world of the beautiful Skyliners! Recently I adjusted the front roof locking nuts on my 57 Skyliner. Mine were too low and instead of turning down, ratcheting and moving the switch, the mechanism jammed under stress. Sometimes the y would not unlock as the motor was stalled. I was able to free them by repeatedly energizing the lock and then unlock relays. At one point I gave it a little persuasion to go up with the palm of my hand. I would say that mine were adjusted properly at one time but the weather seals on the header became hardened and would not compress enough for the locking to be completed properly. I will be installing new weatherstripping this year.

By the way when the locking mechanism is ratcheting, it makes a clicking sound.

[Rick]

I believe my problem is the same. I’ll be at the car today and will first try to free the front locks using your method of energizing the lock and then unlock relays. If it doesn’t help, I’ll uninstall the front locks from the windshield header as described in the workshop manual and free them afterwards.