Driver door lock issue

ghohouston

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Location
Lewisville, Texas
TDI
2001 Jetta Sedan TDI 5 Speed
This is in regards to my 2001 Jetta sedan. I know I have an issue with the door switches or wiring, none of the 4 doors of the car indicate they're open on the instrument cluster, and the puddle lights/ dome lights have a mind of their own, which I'm fairly sure is caused by the faulty door switches. This has been going on for years, but the indicators did work when I originally bought the car. About a year ago, the alarm randomly started going off, etc. Key fob use also caused the alarm to go off in the past, so I have not had a battery in there for years.

Anyhow, girlfriend went to go somewhere today and said the driver door wouldn't unlock physically with the key, and the horn sounded, as if the door was locked. I checked the operation myself, and found the same. Door won't unlock, and the quiet beep sounds when turning the door lock counter clockwise. I was able to get the door open by quickly going clockwise and then back counter clockwise. Does this sound like another issue caused by the door lock module, or does this sound like a mechanical issue? I am going to dig into it this weekend, just looking for some opinions/ ideas. Never messed with Vw locks or door switches before.
 

Tdijarhead

Top Post Dawg
Joined
Nov 10, 2013
Location
Lawrenceville PA
TDI
2003 TDI Jetta Daughters Car, 2001 TDI Beetle, Wife’s car, 2005 Golf TDI Mine, all 5 spds
Start by replacing the module in your drivers door. There are a couple of you tube videos and a write up on this site. Idparts has the module, that’s the one I used for the drivers door since the drivers door seems to be the brain of all four door lock modules. I did a cheap passenger side front door lock module from rock auto, it seems to be working ok so far as does the driver side module. Since you know you have all these door module problems, just go ahead and replace the drivers and passenger modules and reassess.

Here is one you tube video, there are others.

 

U4ick

Veteran Member
Joined
Nov 16, 2014
Location
texas
TDI
2003 jetta tdi
You're about to open a big can of worms. It's a bigger learning curve than most people give it credit for.

From my experience in buying these cars, it is the number one reason why people get rid of their VW.

You can watch youTube videos for a general idea of what is involved but don't use them as a guide.

Use the Bently as your guide and follow the sequence of steps religiously.

Once you get it down, you'll have a good laugh at just how messed up the youTube videos really are.
 

Tdijarhead

Top Post Dawg
Joined
Nov 10, 2013
Location
Lawrenceville PA
TDI
2003 TDI Jetta Daughters Car, 2001 TDI Beetle, Wife’s car, 2005 Golf TDI Mine, all 5 spds
The door lock module also contains the physical latch, so if you do have an actual mechanical problem in addition to the other common door lock issues, then it is still related to the module. I had to replace mine when I let it go long enough that the drivers door would no longer latch every time and when it did latch it would come open at random times.
 

ghohouston

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Location
Lewisville, Texas
TDI
2001 Jetta Sedan TDI 5 Speed
Okay. I replaced both front modules with genuine Vw parts. Still, none of the 4 doors show open on the cluster. Guess that points to either a wiring issue or the ccm. BUT, all of my interior lights now function as they should. And the key cylinder in the drivers door had a broken piece in it, which was the reason the key was not unlocking the door. I also was able to use my ancient Genesis scanner to re program my key fob, so it now works too.

To recap, trunk shows open on cluster, but the other 4 doors do not. The interior lights all now work as they should. I have no stored codes in the ccm, other than code 00953 for interior light time limit. Prior to replacing both front modules, I only had a code for the drivers door lock module.
 

ghohouston

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Location
Lewisville, Texas
TDI
2001 Jetta Sedan TDI 5 Speed
And I no longer have to hit the doors before they will open. Used to have to hit the door near the handle each time after the car was locked and unlocked to re open.
 

ghohouston

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Location
Lewisville, Texas
TDI
2001 Jetta Sedan TDI 5 Speed
The function where you hold the key counterclockwise in the door to roll the windows down does work also, but it always has too. Not sure if that's helpful info.
 

ghohouston

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Location
Lewisville, Texas
TDI
2001 Jetta Sedan TDI 5 Speed
Bumping this back up. Trunk still shows open when open, none of the other 4 doors show open. Removed driver door harness from kick panel and pulled through. Removed the tape/ loom from it and found no broken wires. Anyone else ever had the issue of no open door signal on the cluster? The bulb is also NOT burned out, as I was able to make it come on through some vcds self test I found.
 

braddies

Veteran Member
Joined
Jul 26, 2021
Location
America
TDI
03 golf ALH
Dunno if you've seen this yet but the Stupid door switch $3 fix thread has a lot of good information, 30 pages at the moment.
My symptoms were different than yours so I'm not sure if the CCM is or is not your culprit. I ended up ordering a new switch and soldering it into the drivers door even though the existing switch looked ok the rubber boot was torn.
Even with the new switch installed vcds still showed no change with the door open or closed.
The root cause was found on the metal, rotating latch where it makes contact with the switch, a groove wore through the rubber coating and caused the switch to not move enough and the ccm thought the door was always closed. An xacto knife removed the rest of the rubber from the latch and the new switch was able to move freely open-closed. I opted for the ramp-style switch referenced on one of the later pages of the door switch thread.
Good luck! Do you have access to vcds?

Thanks @fahrvegnugen for the picture!
 

ghohouston

Veteran Member
Joined
Apr 2, 2013
Location
Lewisville, Texas
TDI
2001 Jetta Sedan TDI 5 Speed
I replaced both front door lock modules when this thread was new, with new oem parts. The door open indicators never worked then. I'm certain I seem to remember them working during ownership of the car, but that's going on 7 or so years at this point and almost 300k miles. I do have vcds. Need to hook it back up and see what it thinks the doors are doing. I looked further into the wiring over the weekend briefly and found a spot under the drivers door panel where the harness had a few wires shorted together, which at least 1 of them went to the door card light, as it was acting up, and after repairing the wires, all of the interior lights seem to be working as they should.
 

braddies

Veteran Member
Joined
Jul 26, 2021
Location
America
TDI
03 golf ALH
All that last post was to say that the new switch wasn't working for me because the rubber on the latch had a weird groove worn into it. In hindsight i could have scrapped the rubber off the latch and the old switch would have worked
 
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