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On my Vantage, the driver’s door window randomly drops down slightly—as it does when you open the door handle—and then immediately returns to the closed position. It’s only a small drop, like the usual 10mm or so, and seems identical to the automatic drop when opening the door.
It’s happened a couple of times while driving, and a few times while the car’s been parked. I happened to be working alongside it on another project and it was unlocked (so no alarm sounded).
Alongside that, the car alarm randomly goes off for no apparent reason. I’ve got a strong feeling the two issues are related—that the window drop is triggering the alarm due to a perceived open door/window.
The door itself opens and closes perfectly, the remote fob works fine, mirrors fold and unfold as expected, and the windows operate normally otherwise.
Has anyone come across something similar? I’m leaning towards it being a faulty microswitch in the door handle, but I’d appreciate any thoughts before I start pulling things apart.
Haha! I was just about to do a write up on an obscure problem, that I seem to have solved, in the interest of helping out the next guy. You just might be the next guy
My car is a 2016 Vanquish Volante. Ever since I got it about 18 months ago, it's done that very same window drop/raise that you described. Passenger side, not that it makes a difference, but it was a clue for me -- it happened more often when my wife was in the car as a passenger. It seemed to be random, and could happen in my garage or while driving. I was also having a problem where the battery seemed to struggle holding a charge while parked. No alarm issues like yours, but otherwise sounds very similar.
I could trigger it pretty reliably in my garage by closing the hood, driver door, or trunk. I suspected that the sensors detecting open door/trunk/hood were causing an electrical spike that was picked up by the door module. I spent many thousands of dollars at Aston Martin having it diagnosed -- they replaced both door latch mechanisms. It seemed better most of the time; okay in the garage, but still acting up with a passenger.
Convinced it was the door module, I removed the door card to get the part number. I disconnected everything and used contact cleaner spray on all the connectors. I let it sit like that for a few days and kept an eye on battery drain. I was holding charge. I got in touch with John at ambits to see about a door module. He said that the newer Pektron modules were pretty reliably and didn't fail like the originals used to. He didn't have an exact match on part number, and more or less suggested that the problem might lie elsewhere anyway.
I plugged all the electrical connectors back and continued to watch battery drain. Still holding a charge. Then I realized that the one part that I hadn't connected was the inside door release handle. So I looked at it very closely. It's a bit different from the Vantage and DB9, but pretty similar. The handle had never rested flush with its surround -- something that had bugged me but hadn't gotten around to looking at it. The driver side was flush, so I knew something wasn't quite right.
There's a microswitch in the back that detects a pull on the handle to drop the window. And inside the handle, at least on the Vanquish, there's a little silicone bump stop that absorbs the shock of releasing the pull and holds the handle in the correct position. Either mine was abnormally thick, or the handle was out of tolerance. This meant that the microswitch was barely engaging -- it seems to want the plunger depressed to a detect normal door closed situation. I made up a new shim to take the place of the silicone part and got the handle to rest flush, same as the driver side.
It's been back together for several weeks now, including a number of trips with a passenger. Not one window drop/raise incident, and my battery holds a charge as it should. I think the switch wasn't letting the car go to sleep.
Thank you – that’s a great write-up and I really appreciate it!
I had an unexpected hour to myself last night, so I took the opportunity to remove the door card. I disconnected all the connectors from the module and gave them a good clean with contact cleaner (though to be fair, they all looked fine). I also gave the inside of the door handle a thorough clean with some spray and managed to get a bit of WD40 in there. I’m fairly sure I could see the cables for the handle switch, so I gave those a good spray too.
Everything went back together easily – it’s a pretty straightforward job. Unfortunately, after testing, the issue is still there.
I might try again and this time leave the handle switch unplugged to see if that changes anything. I’m assuming the door handle switch being unplugged won’t cause any issues (other than the window not dropping), but I’ll take care when opening and closing the door just in case.
I had a quick look through the workshop manual and it looks like the handle can’t be removed without first taking out the window and its mechanism... should be fun!
I just watched the aston1936 door card removal video again to remind myself what the Vantage/DB9 interior door handle looked like. It's different in that it doesn't have the microswitch that was the root of my problem. The recognition that the door is being opened from the inside must be happening at the latch mechanism in your case, triggered by the cable pull. That's probably why Aston replaced my door latches, thinking of the way Vantage/DB9 detect door opening.
For contrast, here's what the Vanquish interior door handle looks like, with the electrical connector for the microswitch causing my issues. In my case the part of the handle that you pull (on the left side of the picture) was sticking out a couple of millimeters. The one in the picture is lying flush with the handle body.
It also has the pull cable attachment with the little "T" end on it, but I can see from the parts diagrams that the latching mechanism and door lock is a different part among DB9/Vantage/Vanquish.
I think you're spot on—there’s likely a switch inside the door latch as well. I gave it a decent clean (as best I could), but I have a feeling I’ll end up removing both the latch and handle switch to get them on the bench. May as well, especially now the window's out.
A few months ago, I had a persistent issue with the handbrake microswitch. It seemed to be stuck "on" and would trigger the chime while driving. The OEM replacement was surprisingly expensive, but I discovered the same part was used in an older Land Rover. Instead of buying one, I 3D printed a small component to solve the issue—cost me less than a penny, and it’s worked perfectly ever since.
