Electrical Gremlin

[WV Jim]

About six weeks ago I started the car and pushed the switch to lower my driver's side window - nothing happened. I tried all four windows - nothing. A few seconds later I pushed the driver's side window switch again, and the window worked fine, as did all the other windows. Same thing a few days later. Didn't happen very often, just once every few days, and only delayed working for a few seconds each time.

About a week ago I was rolling the window down and it stopped dead halfway down. It took ten minutes or so before it would roll back up. Luckily it wasn't raining at the time.

Note: it's not only the four windows that refuse to budge, the sun roof also refuses to open each time the windows go on strike.

Friday the windows (and the sun roof) wouldn't work at all, all day. Saturday they worked just fine. Yesterday they wouldn't work until late in the day.

My question: what in the hell could cause this? I didn't think that the windows and the sun roof were in the same electrical circuit, but apparently I'm wrong.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[medic1dl]

You obviously have a break in a wire or wires somewhere, that at some point is making contact so you can use the windows. These problems can be very hard and time consuming to locate and fix. I'd start looking at the doors or more specifically the wiring harness that goes from the door to the body of the car. In most of these cases it is a ground that is the culprit as when you use the window switch it is completing the ground circuit for the windows to function. Get a wiring diagram (Bentley's) to see where the grounds are and start hunting.

Good luck.

[flyfishvt]

You have a 93' so the fix is very easy. Your comfort relay is faulty. Do a search for comfort relay and you'll find tons of threads and DIY's on fixing it.

[medic1dl]

You have a 93' so the fix is very easy. Your comfort relay is faulty. Do a search for comfort relay and you'll find tons of threads and DIY's on fixing it.

That was my next guess.

[WV Jim]

The consensus seems to be the comfort relay. I appreciate everyone's input.

[WV Jim]

I bought the comfort relay from the dealer for less than $30. I used this DIY:

http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?p=19297398

Took me less than 30 minutes and fixed the problem.

Thanks to all for the help.