'93 Door Alert Light/Trunk Catch Problem

[Praxis]

Hi,

Hoping you don't mind giving an ould Irish Granny a little advice?

I have a '93 Corolla XLi hatch. It has one silly, irritating fault.

The hatch release lever on front does not release the hatch and, whatever has happened in there, the door alert and dome light do not always go off with all doors closed...when this happens the only cure is to get out go round back, open hatch, fiddle with catch and close hatch until the door light goes off (no fun late at night in wet weather).

Past couple of days it keeps blowing fuses (I suspect mostly because the door alert light is still in "live" condition while I try to replace them), as this is the fuse to the dome light and clock as well it is VERY annoying.

Probably a bad earth or similar on the wiring to the hatch.

What I need to know is exactly where to look for the "switch" (or whatever) in the hatch, and how to trace the cable or whatever releases the hatch? Because a wild guess tells me the two are related problems...

G

[Praxis]

It's ok, I got it...

The whole bottom of the lock is slightly out of alignment, which fixed my problem with the door light but the front lever is going to take lots of painstaking "trial and error" before the hatch will pop open from the lever...

The fuse blew because the dome lightbulb had somehow got loose and wedged itself into the wrong place...

G