Trango

It has been noticed lately (especially by passengers in the rear , quick to haze me about my vehicle's maintenance cycles) that my rear window switches haven't been working, only functioning when the control switch is held down. As such, the switch seems to have either broken something or is lacking a "hold down" in its workings, turning it into a SPST pushbutton, into a momentary switch.

Well, I just dismantled the entire switch, and while I didn't find the culprit, I did realize that there is no conceivable time I'd want those switches to NOT work.

So, on the master control switch part, I found the "slider" that controls those rear switches, and I wired it shut. It appears that the left "slider" controls the LED's that notify whether those switches are activated or not, and the right "slider" controls the actual windows.

I put a small dab of solder on the right slider, removed the sliding bit of metal from the moving part of the switch (which is now obviated), snapped everything back together, and it now works like a charm.

Anyway, it took me about 20 minutes, and solves a major problem when you're transporting 4 grungy dudes back from skiing and one of them HAFE's it up after spending all day above treeline.

Rally_nutcase_1982

my window lock/unlock button located in the driver side armrest is toast since 2004 and I never bothered to fix it.
I'm just too much of a chicken if it comes to panel removal or similar tasks. I always think some little $0.10 clip might break off and lead to more costs.

And having experienced years of Audi's "non-logical" electronics and wiring.....well....kudos to everyone like you who can pull it off :-)

Trango

After you unclip the assembly and remove it from the door, bring it to your well-lit and dark-cloth-covered work bench.

Then, there is a trickiness when you remove the switch assembly from the overall body - I used three thin jeweller's flatheads on the three clips on each side to gently spread the housing, and then with gentle fingerpressure on the individual window switches to maintain that one side unattached, I moved the three small screwdrivers to the other side and repeated that.

So, that was tricky.

Then, the other tricky part is reassembly of the master lock button, but that is really not that bad. Anyone familiar with the care and 20 second-long patience of small part dis/reassembly would be fine.

allroad(s) lead 2Gavin

My switch recently failed in the manner you described... Extended warranty covered it...

Rally_nutcase_1982

For that kind of work I'd rather pay someone like yourself, my H0 scale trains are small enough to play around with ;-) And these, I can screw up w/o bleeding my wallet.
Either way, great job - well done!

skidmark

catch and hold the button down. Someone on the board actually fixed his switch, I remember the post. I broke mine cleaning the interior, I am just careful around that switch now.

Trango

Yes, the problem seems mechanical, exactly that - it doesn't latch in the depressed position.

BonanzaMan

2nd. I just bought a new switch off ebay for about $35, then 5 mins to install.

ryan_wilkerson

I know this is an older thread but it really helped me. I had ordered an OEM window switch but it had the same problem, the Child Lock button didn't work causing the rear window buttons to be deactivated. It was a pain having my kids ask me to depress the child lock button while they held down the window switch in the rear door to roll the window down. I took the switch apart, removed the two metal contacts and springs behind them (these are located inside the child lock button) and then soldered the two far right contacts together. It's a small gap so the solder easily bridged it. Now the windows work full time! I have some photos so I'll try to upload those here to help others.

Much thanks to Bob (Trango) for this thread and solution!

-Ryan

echops

How did you mishandle the switch from the armrest? Did you need to remove the door trim?

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'01 allroad 6MT
Boulder,CO