Hello everyone, sorry in advance for any typos, I am typing this very hastily. I am in a pinch right now and need help ASAP. I am currently on a 1500 mile road trip from home, nowhere near an aston martin dealership, on a Sunday no less.
I am in desperate need of someone to tell me which wire in the harness feeds to the master window switch. I also would like to know how to remove the door panel, as I am currently stuck. The car is a 2011 rapide, which has a different window/handle assembly than the other aston models. The vantage and other models seem so simple, but I cannot find anything on the Rapide. The reason is as follows:
This morning, outside of my hotel, the master switch for the windows died, of course after rolling them all down. So here I am outside of a hotel, with a freshly purchased tool kit, hoping to fix the issue. I know the issue is a wire in the rubber-covered harness loom, as about 5 months ago I had instances of losing power to the master switch when opening the door. I was able to squeeze the rubber-covered harness that goes from the body of the car into the door by the hinge, which restored power. That happened several times, and I kept telling myself to take the door apart one day and rectify the wire that must be nearly broken which is causing that. 5 months go by, and the issue disappeared completely, and I forgot all about it. Until now, at which point I believe the wire may have broken completely. Hence my reason for needing to know which wire I should look at within the harness, as I cut off the rubber surround and removed the black "gunk" holding it together, and there are no broken wires. So I believe the wire may have broken within its insulation.
However, I am very disappointed in myself, as I sliced through a few wires in the process of removing the very thick rubber surround. I started this at 5 am (as soon as I realized I could not get the driver window to roll back up) when it was still dark out, because im desperately trying to beat the incoming rainstorm we are supposed to be having in a few hours.
With no place to keep the car covered on my road trip, my only option would be to tape a bag over the window which is not a viable solution for the rest of the trip. So I attempted to remove the door panel in the parking lot, in hopes of pulling out the entire harness and repairing all of the wires that lead out of the door into the connector on the body. However, after removing every bolt I could see, which were 2 on the bottom, one under the small airbag cover, one under the speaker grill, one inside the door pocket near the bottom of the silver pull handle piece, one in the defroster circle, and one at the rear of the silver pull handle piece under the two piece leather covers. The door panel is now almost entirely ready to come off, however it is being held on by something I cannot see that is at the front of the silver pull handle piece. The silver pull piece I keep referring to is that horizontal metal trim piece that houses the door handle and the window switch. It seems to be secured towards the front where it meets the leather, but I cannot see any bolt and can't figure out how to remove the window switch to check inside. Im trying to make as few marks as possible, but i am having a very difficult time. Please, if you know which wire I should look at for the window switch, or if you know how to remove the panel, let me know asap. Thank you very much in advance.

 

Sorry to read about your situation. I'd drive it to garage for night and bring it by a mechanic on Monday. Good luck.

 

Inquire on Pistonheads too if you haven’t already....UK time difference but very active Aston group.

 

i wouldn't put too much faith in the wire being broken. sure, it can happen, but nine times out of ten it will be a loose connection rather than a wire spontaneously breaking. unless, of course, there is more to the story...

 

Thanks everyone. I am here to update. There is definitely not more to the story besides a wire having simply broken over time. The only function affected was the power to the master switch, which as I said was intermittent for the last half a year or so (squeezing the wiring would allow it to work again) and the wire simply broke entirely this time (squeezing had no effect on making the master switch work again.)
So I was able to finally remove the door panel, and I applied power using a drill battery to the window motor itself to get the window to roll up. I am finishing my road trip with a non- working drivers window, which in my opinion is better than having it open all the time. I will simply replace the harness when I get home. Thanks.

 

did you ever fix this issue? I’m having a similar problem when I open my door wide the power and light goes out. Pinching the tube brings it back on. Any guidance?