I was out in the car yesterday and was driving down some country lanes in the dark flitting between main and full beam.

The switch / stalk didnt feel quitre right and suddenly it stuck, so now the cars lights are permenantly on full beam... im sure this happened a while ago and next time I went back to the car it was ok again.

Has anyone experienced this before / is it common?

I guess im gonna have to take apart the stalk assembley and have a look but electrics are my weak point so thought id check if anyone has a quick fix.

Thanks

probably a bit obvious but the quickest fix is just to replace it , once they start to go it usually just keeps happening , I am sure either Mr Farell or Mac will have a reasonably priced one in there treasure trove of spares

The housing around the switches breaks. A cable tie or two can be used to hold it together again. No need to take anything apart

edit: Of course, it may not be a broken housing, but it happened in my first two 300s.

if you take the wheel off you should see a pari of plastic bracing pieces over the top and bottom of the two stalks, I've had this break a couple of times on various cars and depending on how it breaks you can lose indicators, full beam control or wiper control. it's fairly easy to drill some alliminium or similar to hold it in place.

d3k4y0 wrote:if you take the wheel off you should see a pari of plastic bracing pieces

Oh yes, that's what I was refering to when I said 'housing'. I'm not very good with technical terms.

Anyhow, The cable ties did the job. There may have been a bit of glue involved as well, but it wouldn't have held on its own. I didn't bother taking the wheel off

That could well be it, will investigate tonight!

Indicators do not self cancel now either so guess it is the housing around all the switches that is broken

i know its not related to Sam's problem but on the broken indicator mounting side of things, had this problem too but previous owner broke it and there wasnt really any holes left to screw the indicator/fullbeam switch in, shaped up bits of plastic to overlap the mounts where broken) top and bottom were totally gone) and drilled holes where needed and cable tied it all together, i have pictures on my phone but must have deleted them off my pc and i dont have a phone to pc cable anymore, im pretty sure Ali may have a copy of the pictures floating about?

cheers

Nate

I've had this problem too, as others have said, it was the housing beneath the steering wheel with the horn contacts on it:



I bodged mine same as everyone else - but there are two of them on eBay at the moment if you feel like fixing it properly.

BTW: I've had problems with inadvertantly turning full beam on with that stalk - and to flash full beam from low beam is pretty awkward - anyone come up with a mod to make it all a bit more user friendly?

Thinking about it now when we were away in europe the horn was working intermittently, ( thought it was over use )this would probably be why i guess..... will check out tommorow

EDIT:- Sorted.......was just one of the screws that holds the unit together and holds the full beam wire connection that had fallen out and disconnected wire....