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Adventures with Jalpa #370

37K views 248 replies 25 participants last post by  1carnut 
#1 · (Edited)
Yesterday I took delivery of Jalpa #370, thereby beginning my Jalpa ownership experience.

Known projects that I will be fixing very soon--

1. Fix the headlights: the previous owner had to fiddle with the switches to make them come on-- about 10 to 15 switch flips, but they did eventually come on, and then proceeded to go off in the middle of the drive in the evening.

2. Fix the exterior rear view mirrors -they seem like they are both beyond loose and ready to fall off

3. Sort through the battery drain issue-- previous owner claims its the bazillion watt stereo system that is in the car

4. Complete Brake and Fuel system checks prior to additional driving

5. I am taking feedback on other critical things to check on the car. Please provide comments, as I am new to Jalpa-land.

It was a snowy day when I took delivery of the car, so the specs in the picture are snowflakes falling. I had shoveled the street and driveway twice to clear the snow, but I still had some traction events getting up the driveway.
 

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#7 ·
Thanks for the registration of your car, very nice, I think the issues are not that huge to be sorted out till spring.
 
#9 ·
Congratulation, on your new car!
Typically I have found my electical issues to be due to either bad earths, or the pins have pushed out the back of the relay panels, if you do remove the relays make sure that the plugs have not pushed out the back when you put them back in. On a car that is now 25 years old I would be replaceing ALL the rubber hoses, fuel, coolant and brake hoses.
Best of luck
Mike
 
#11 ·
Congrats. I am glad you got it, just not glad it was not mine you bought :)

Looks to be in pretty good shape.

Send me an email again and I will send you everything digital I have including the wire diagram and lots of other info. Also get owner access to Raymond's site if you have not already.

Have fun driving!
 
#12 ·
Finally had the chance to start troubleshooting the headlight behavior. The error state is-- previous owner had to rapidly switch headlight and park light switches in order for the headlights to come on while we were driving. Took about 30 button pushes for lights to come on. Then after driving for 10 minutes, headlights went out.

Front and rear hazard lights work fine (side marker lights do not flash)Sometime dash indicator light comes on when parking light switch is hit, sometimes it doesn't, but parking lights never come on.

The relay panel is what is giving me troubles. See picture for relays that are on the car. The relay types do not match what I have seen on other posts and I have never seen the two hidden fuse boxes on other posts, thus I am not sure what relays are supposed to go where and what type they should be

Probably unrelated but-
Cleaned all the fuse terminals.

I have two hidden fuse boxes One rectangular box in top center with a 25 amp fuse and diode, and one square box with 3 fuses and diode (front to back-- diode, 8 amp, 16 amp, 8 amp).

Fuses that are in the vehicle do not match the drivers manual, so once I find new fuses, I'll correct to the drivers manual values

Fuse 7 is 25 amp, manual says it should be 15 amp
Fuse 9 is 16 amp, manual says it should be 25 amp
Fuse 11 is 16 amp, manual says it should be 25 amp
Fuse 12 is 25 amp, manual says it should be 15 amp
 

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#16 · (Edited)
The head lights are an odd system on the Jalpa, the headlights won't pop up if the parklights are NOT on, ie once you turn the parklights on, then push the headlight button the lights should pop up, now if you press the park light button both the head lights will drop and the park lights will go off, next time you press the park lights both come back on, but the park lights MUST be on before the head lights will turn on. This suggests to me that two relays control the operation of the lights, ie once the park light relay is energized then it will supply power to the headlight relay. My suggestion is to follow the black wires from the relays (they are daisy chained) until you hit the body of the car and MAKE SURE it has a GOOD connection.
The relay that is missing from the main relay panel is the indicator unit from memory, there is a photograph on Raymonds site with what most of the relays do, not sure why your Hazards are working, I thought the flasher relay served both hazards & indicator. The two electrical diagrams on Raymonds site can also be very useful in fault finding.
Best of luck
Mike
 
#13 ·
I am sure you have noticed, but the relays seat very poorly in the panel. There is no positive connection on the backside, and if you just push them in then "push-out" the connectors on the backside. So, when inserting the relays make sure to remove the box so you can hold the female connectors in place so you get a positive connection.
 
#17 ·
I have been able to make my headlights work (and several other electrical items that were not working) by manually powering up the circuits. I noticed my brake lights were not working, so after much debugging, I found that the brake light switch never was getting 12V. By manually adding 12V to that circuit everything works (headlights, dash, etc). All issues seem to lead to relay 7 and relay 8 circuits on the schematics. The problem is-- where on the car should relays 7 and 8 be?
 
#18 ·
#19 ·
If you have the wiring diagrams available from the Raymonds Jalpa site, find out what color wires are going to the relay and then search for those color wires on the back of the relay panel and/or other relay locations, between the two electrical diagrams you can normally trace most things.
Best of luck
Mike
 
#21 ·
Thank you all for the wonderful tips on diagnosing the electricals. I am still working on getting everything to work. I got sidetracked with a vacation and then finding out that my brake light switch was bad. Since I thought brakes were more important (and easier) than fixing the headlights, I tackled that slippery slope project first. Good news is-- brake lights now work once I replaced the hydraulic actuated switch. Will do brake fluid flush and gear lube change before getting back to headlight troubleshooting.

Spring is here and the salt is washed off the roads around town so I am reinspired
 
#22 ·
Congrats on your new Jalpa. I had relay probs also. Also use a voltmeter and check for voltage drops. If your power windows drag,check out my post on power window fix for Jalpa and older Lamborghinis.Also make sure and check all your grounds many cars have ground problems.Use a voltmeter on the ground side of a relay or switch ground that to the neg on the battery energize the switch or relay and viola.A poor ground will show a spike.Good luck. Lee. PS The advice about the relay connectors is absolutely right. They push out very easily and make momentary contact. Also check yhe function of your relays with an ohmmeter.They do not all function the same!!!
 
#23 ·
Pictures from first car show with Jalpa 370

Labor day weekend (it was a while ago now, but just had time to review pictures), took Jalpa 370 down to Columbus Ohio for the Italian Gathering show. 450 miles of driving the Jalpa and no problems. About 20 Lamborghinis (Including a Miura and Espada) and even more Ferraris. Great time, but I was the only Jalpa!
 

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#26 ·
Hose replacement, mirror replacement

Some preventative maintainance I took care of during the summer--

Cooling hose replacement (Thanks Sledge4.2 for the cross reference for HPS silicone hoses)-

HTSR-112-138-BLK (reducers-- qty 4)

Since I was under the car and placing an order with HPS I also ordered

HTSEC90-112-BLK (Qty 3-- Upper and lower radiator hoses, front of engine 90 degree coolant hose)-- These are 28 mm 90 degree hoses

HTST-3F-112-BLK (3 ft of 28 mm hose for all the under tunnel hose connections)-- you could probably get away with ordering two feet as I have plenty left, or if you are really careful you have to trim the legs off the 90 degree hoses and you might be able to use those trimmed pieces as the couplers between some of the underbody tubes

I also replaced the floppy small rear view mirrors with Baby Tornado rear view mirrors. They bolted on using the existing factory holes and provide a slightly larger mirror surface so you can see more. While driving in the hot summer, I was a little disappointed that the set I had recieved still seemed to droop over time when driven briskly at freeway speeds. These are not powered mirrors.
 

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#27 ·
Header Tank / Expansion Tank Repair

While driving home last week, noticed a slight coolant smell coming from the rear. Turns out the lower solder seam on the tank had developed a pin hole leak. After a quick repair from Ferndale Radiator (just outside of Detroit), the Jalpa is back on the road.
 

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