Well this wasn’t as bad a job as I was expecting. 👍

 

The issue started to become apparent a few weeks before total failure, with the drivers window switch intermittently failing. Over the next two weeks the failure progressively became more frequent, finally giving up the ghosts entirely.

 

Diagnosing the problem started with me testing the others window switches with both front and rear near side working but neither front nor rear offside working.

The other issues that came up were that the off side doors wouldn’t lock (however the fuel cap did), the mirror adjusting switch also didn’t work and there were no lights to any of the drivers door switches.

 

After a bit of Googling I found myself inspecting the door harness between the hinges. After peeling the rubber sleeving back I could see that a number of the cables had broken.

I ordered a repair kit from eBay and got to work when it arrived. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Left-Right-Door-Cable-Wiring-Harness-Loom-Plug-For-SKODA-ROOMSTER-SUPERB-YETI/333814539014?hash=item4db8e5a306:g:RVkAAOSwnRpfyz47

 

I decided to replace as much of the harness as the kit provided as, in my opinion, trying to fix the issue in the hinge would only lead to failure again as the existing cable was very brittle compared to the new stuff in the repair kit.

I cut what remained attached to the harness connector, removed the door card and pulled the harness through the door.

I trimmed the cables back to the outer skin of the door and used these brilliant soldering joints to attach the new tails on. (My soldering has never been as good as I would like and these things are so easy to use.)

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/281x-Waterproof-Solder-Seal-Heat-Shrink-Wire-Cable-Connectors-Crimps-Butt-Joint/393138233400?hash=item5b88dd6038:g:dmkAAOSwdPxgLf-Y

 

After extending the harness, re-taping and pushing back through the door and protective hinge cover and that remained was to hook up to the new connection block.

 

Abracadabra, everything was working again. The job took around two hours to complete and is easily done with a few basic tools.

 

TIP

To remove the rubber sleeve between the door. Pull the harness cables through the door, then push the sleeve into to door and then pull it out. I think trying to pry it out will lead to damaging the sleeve.

Mine has just been replaced by a dealer after taking out both OS doors. Plus electric windows and the mirror adjustment. You have done a good job there. 

 

I never realised there was such an easy repair plug with wires option available. Most advice was to solder or replace the whole loom. 

Edited 11 April, 20215 yr by gav_is_con
More text

9 hours ago, gav_is_con said:

Mine has just been replaced by a dealer after taking out both OS doors. Plus electric windows and the mirror adjustment. You have done a good job there. 

 

I never realised there was such an easy repair plug with wires option available. Most advice was to solder or replace the whole loom. 

 

Thanks, it’s one of a few jobs where I thought it couldn’t have gone any better. 👍
Everthing I had read on the subject was doom and gloom too. But I thought it was worth a go once I found you could buy a repair kit. I should also say that the repair kit doesn’t offer you like for like cables. The is some deviation in colour (which is another reason why I joined the cables where I did so that anyone can trace the colour back), and there may be a slight difference in the gauge of cable as I couldn’t read what the originals are (but they look the same). 

Great job! I recently did this job on mine, its really not that bad at all once you get the door card off and just really take your time. Although its definitely a job I think I could do again in half the time now I've done it once!

 

 

Hey Guys!

I had a Similair case on my 2014 Superb 2 Kombi.

For now i dont have the repair kit available, but we managed to wire in some sections, with my trusty car electrician buddy.

However the module still doesnt work, meaning that the driver side door controlls are ineffective.

I am able to pull windows up and down via keyfob. This tells me our fix was good, because the motors and the commanding in the unit work.

Is there an error message in the ECU somwhere which should be cleraed because there is a airbag sensor in the door i think. Could that be limiting us?

Thanks for your comments,

1 hour ago, Slashdead said:

Hey Guys!

I had a Similair case on my 2014 Superb 2 Kombi.

For now i dont have the repair kit available, but we managed to wire in some sections, with my trusty car electrician buddy.

However the module still doesnt work, meaning that the driver side door controlls are ineffective.

I am able to pull windows up and down via keyfob. This tells me our fix was good, because the motors and the commanding in the unit work.

Is there an error message in the ECU somwhere which should be cleraed because there is a airbag sensor in the door i think. Could that be limiting us?

Thanks for your comments,

Does the backlighting of the switch panel work when the vehicle lights are on? The switches and backlighting rely on the same earth wire for their operation, so checking the backlighting may demonstrate if the earth is compromised.

41 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

Does the backlighting of the switch panel work when the vehicle lights are on? The switches and backlighting rely on the same earth wire for their operation, so checking the backlighting may demonstrate if the earth is compromised.

Hey Pete!

Outstanding idea, actually no they dont light which i haven't even thought about.

We will check the ground than.

In our case would you suspect our fix was not good enaugh or could there another ground issue?

Thanks

Andor

The (brown) earth to the switchpack comes from pin 5 of the 32-way connector of the door module. It splits off to various bits of the door electrics from here (like the locking warning light), but does not appear to connect back into the main car loom via the connector at the A-pillar.

So I guess the easiest thing to try is maybe take a wire from a known earth point on the vehicle, and join it to the brown wire that comes from the switchpack (pin 4 of the 10-way connector at switchpack). See if that fixes everything.

If it does, you can maybe make a shorter link from the thick brown earth wire on pin 20 of the 20-way connector

Edited 24 March, 20251 yr by Breezy_Pete

16 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

The (brown) earth to the switchpack comes from pin 5 of the 32-way connector of the door module. It splits off to various bits of the door electrics from here (like the locking warning light), but does not appear to connect back into the main car loom via the connector at the A-pillar.

So I guess the easiest thing to try is maybe take a wire from a known earth point on the vehicle, and join it to the brown wire that comes from the switchpack (pin 4 of the 10-way connector at switchpack). See if that fixes everything.

If it does, you can maybe make a shorter link from the thick brown earth wire on pin 20 of the 20-way connector

So your bet would be that the ground in not continuos between the A Pillar connection to the various modules?

And even that the break in the wiring is most likely not connected to the fix that we made, but rather in somwhere else in the door?

I'm not exactly sure what my bet would be. Did you take any photos of the a-pillar wiring before you started the repair?

Do the experiment with an added earth connection, data always helps. 🙂

1 minute ago, Breezy_Pete said:

I'm not exactly sure what my bet would be. Did you take any photos of the a-pillar wiring before you started the repair?

Do the experiment with an added earth connection, data always helps. 🙂

Unfortunatelly i wasnt smart enaugh to photograph any of the issue.

But unknown by the this was already once fixed, with incorrect wire thicknesses which made the issue even worse.

I now ordered this part: https://www.autoalkatreszonline24.hu/esen-skv/20709236

And we will do a change to the new connector, than check the ground

My current hypothosis is that maybe the fix wasnt 100% good

we shall see