Touch screen opens and closes by itself

First post!! Thrilled to be here!!

I live outside Ottawa by a more than a few country miles, had the car floated to me on a truck just last week.

And this weekend the dreaded up/down screen horror show...

Was negotiating with dealer to come and retrieve when I tried the button trick.
- car off, hold start till beep, hold screen close button til stop, let go.

did that twice and the screen is staying still! I had been pulling the starter battery cable all weekend till
this was sorted out. And no trip back to the dealer!!

This is an ominous leap for me...I am an old school gearhead, three rides in the yard (bike/camper/convertible) that
are 30-50 years old. I can see how this is going to be a whole new experience!!!

oh, the audacity and hopefulness of a noob

Yeah, that button thing worked....once.

Just drove the car and same deal; up/down with the Nav screen once the car is turned off.

Could not recreate my earlier success with the button pushing dance, so now its a bit of
cedar taped to hold the OPEN/TILT button down, that keeps the screen up.

And send the truck, we are off to the dealer!!

I sheepishly will admit I closed the deal on the car thinking it was sold soon after the build date
of 4/15. But it didn't sell until 9/15, so I believe this will be under warranty.

I was about to load the car in my buddies car trailer for the trip to the dealer in Ottawa and the screen
would no longer open/close on its own!

I guess the cleaner used in the detailing dried out?

One week in, love the car!

For several months the 'fix' of holding down the tilt button for ten seconds while shutting off the car worked. Then it didn't. So I got into it and followed Jkline's instructions best I could. It's not easy and like VincentGen1 pointed out- it's the small white cable near the center bottom. Don't do this unless you are handy with car electronics and small screws. I was a mechanic and still some of Nissan's connection routines were baffling to me. It appears it is fixed now. There is no tilt and no dimming feature for the screen but at least I can park it without the battery draining and won't be embarrassed when I have to trade it in. Thanks everyone.

I just picked up my first Leaf (2012 SL), and like any proud parent, the first thing I did was detail it. I doing so, I must have gotten some Windex behind the open/close button on the nav screen, for I am now having the same problem that first prompted this thread 8 years ago. The "hold the power button" technique doesn't work for me, nor does spraying some contact cleaner and compressed air into the button. So I am about to attempt VincentGen1's technique. Before I dig in, I have 3 questions that I was hoping VincentGen1 or someone else who attempted this might be able to answer:

VincentGen1 said:

... So I cleaned the pcb with alcohol ...

Click to expand...

Did you literally wipe down the entire board with a cloth wetted with electronics cleaner/alcohol?

VincentGen1 said:

... sprayed four layers Plasti Dip liquid electrical tape on the pcb ...

Click to expand...

Did you spray the entire board, front and back? Did you tape off where the cable attaches to the PCB, or did you cover that as well?

VincentGen1 said:

I covered the two buttons with small pieces of tape.

Click to expand...

Do you mean the buttons on the front of the screen bezel (dim and open/close), or are there buttons/contacts somewhere on the PCB that you taped?

Thanks for the help!

All I had to do was put in a CD! Ran in to this problem yesterday. I knew I had to reset the touch screen somehow. Try it, just put in a CD when the car in on and let it run a bit.

Interesting solution @norwayleaf! Spraying contact cleaner and compressed air into the button and then letting it sit for a day solved my problem... at least for now! If it recurs, I will try your CD trick.

That this post was resurrected, and missing a functioning dimmer switch, I took the CPU out (or whatever you call it), took the flip screen apart, wiped down the connections and put it all back together. It was challenging.

It is now functioning as it should.

For future reference, keep all moisture/liquid/cleaners away from the touch screen-- spray the cloth not the screen.

45 min from start to finish.

Did anyone ever find an easy fix to this?

Or us the only way to take it all apart?

Thanks in Advance.

markarman said:

Did anyone ever find an easy fix to this?

Click to expand...

I bought some aerosol contact cleaner and sprayed it into the button, then blasted the same area with compressed air and let it sit for a day with the battery disconnected. That did the trick for me. No recurrence after 5 months.

My 2011 Leaf started doing this right after its very first "detailing" a few days ago (no, we don't wash our cars very often). I followed VincentGen1's disassembly instructions and got down to the skinny little PCB that contains the two switches and is connected to the display with a white ribbon cable.

That ribbon cable connection was the problem for me. Liquid got in there and caused some minor corrosion which produced a whitish paste that bridged across the tiny gold contacts. You need to disconnect the ribbon cable and clean the cable and the socket. To disconnect the cable, use your fingernail to pick at the tiny black bar on the connector until the bar folds away from the ribbon, rotating about 90 degrees. Then the ribbon just slips out. I cleaned the cable with a Q-tip and alcohol and I sorta cleaned the socket with a Q-tip stem (paper) cut at an acute angle with a razor blade then dipped in alcohol. I dried out the connector with a hair dryer prior to reassembly.

Also, I did not have to heat the little screws to loosen them. If your screwdriver fits well enough, you can just break the loctite with torque.

Thanks, Forum!

I know this is a very old thread, but what did you heat the screws with? I've tried a soldering iron on the head and a hair dryer on the whole area, but neither worked. 4 of the 5 screws are locked tight. Thanks!

I just used a screwdriver and while putting downward pressure on the sd, twisted it with pliers.