1991 SL300 (WDB129) - Soft Top Not Retracting

[marvinroy1]

I live in East London and own a 1991 SL300 (WDB129). I am currently struggling to keep this car on the road as things are a bit difficult at the moment. I am trying to use this forum to attempt to locate the problem on the car as we just can't afford to go to Mercedes.

The soft top is up and will not retract and I don't know why. A friend tried to diagnose the fault location but said that when he plugged his machine in, it said something about low voltage (will shortly post exact message) so it couldn't give him the fault information. He said the battery was Ok though. He advised I go to Mercedes to get a diagnosis but I can't afford their prices. I read about the LED reader from Radio Shack and wondered how and whether it may work to find the fault location.

Any help would be massively appreciated...
Regards
Marvin

[bobterry99]

You need nothing more than a wire or paper clip to read the top and roll bar codes on a '90-'93 car, Marvin. The socket for the top controller on your vehicle is #10, and the procedure is here: http://www.benzworld.org/forums/r129-sl-class/1266535-diagnostics-sl-pre-94-a.html?

[tecqboy]

bad post removed

[tecqboy]

You have a very common problem with the early model 129's. You can diagnose and reset the error codes without any special tools or code reader.
If there are bad components, the error code will tell you were to look. Most likely is that all it needs is to clear the error codes to get it working. Follow the link in the above post.

[marvinroy1]

Hi Tecqboy & Bob

Thank you very much for responding to my thread and for sharing your expertise. your guidance is very much appreciated.

I will update you both with how I get on...

Thanks a lot
Marvin