Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Intermittent Headlight On Chime failure

Did some limited searching and found this, a related topic:
http://www.contour.org/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=trouble&Number=14597&Forum=All_Forums&Words=Light%20Chime&Match=Entire%20Phrase&Searchpage=0&Limit=25&Old=1year&Main=9751&Search=true#Post14597

Couple days ago I had an assist from a co-worker who told me my lights were on. I discovered that the lights-on chime wasn't working. Also noticed that opening the driver side door doesn't trigger the interior dome light - although all (3) other doors did.

The problem became intermittent this morning when the dome light AND the lights-on chime worked.

To me this sounds like a short but I wasn't clear where to begin looking. Peeking thru the list of fuses I didn't see any names that would indicate they were dedicated to the lights-on chime itself. I was leaning towards opening up the door or investigating the door-open sensor right in the jam - believe I noticed a single screw.

I don't think this is related to any recall work - I'm fairly certain I'm current, including getting the wiring harness recall done a few months ago.

As to my car in general - I bought it new off a dealers lot back in 1995 for the same reason I think most of you did. It looked nice, few people had them (at the time), and very few drove a SE, and it just felt like a fun car to drive. I suffered through getting the serpentine/splash shield fix three or four times, and all the other little things. I've only had to change one water pump (split in half like you're probably thinking) and currently have a CEL, that I believe I can fix by cleaning out the EGR passages since my vacuum pump says the EGR is in good shape.

Want to say that although I don't have a lot to add to most discussions over the past few years, reading here has been invaluable to diagnosing and fixing just about everything on this car. Thanks. Love the car but as it's approaching it's declining years, have to admit I'm seriously thinking about replacing it.

95 SE MTX

Mike

I've been having the same problem with my 95 Mystique. So far I've traced it to the switch in the door frame. I find if I push it in a couple of times and wiggle it around, that the lights come on and the keys/lights-on/door open chime work again.
So since it looks like the switch is either dying or is just dirty (probably the latter from it's location), I'm going to try some electrical lube of some type. Possably silicon spray to clean it up.

Welcome onboard.
Driver's door jamb switch the most likely culprit as Freefall has already noted. Switch provides ground to circuit (i.e. 12 volts present on wire until switch provides ground).