I have what may be a very simple problem I hope. My driver's side front directional is not working. Never had a problem with it before. I changed the bulbs out from side to side because the pass side works fine. The driver's side lamp doesn't light. However, when I take the driver's side out and put it in the pass side it works fine. I cleaned up the ground on the light and cleaned the horn relay terminals and the leads as well. I drove the car last night and the headlights didn't come on. I wiggled a wire on the horn relay and they came on.
I unhooked the underhoood lamp to take the hood off recently. I had the car cut out completely with no power. No power to the starter, lights, nothing. I wiggled a wire at the horn relay because I thought that it may have been something I had messed with while I unhooked the lamp. The car started. No problems with starting since. But, had a problem with the headlamps.
Any thoughts, comments, would be appreciated.

 

1. These are two separate problems.

2. Do the parking lights work on both sides? Is the problem only the signal lights?

3. Turn on the parking lights, remove the left signal light bulb, and use a test light with one end connected to the battery (-) to probe each of the two terminals in the bottom of the bulb socket.
One should be hot.
Now turn on the left signal lights (or the 4-ways) and check again - the other terminal should be flashing hot.
If both are hot when they are supposed to be, you have a ground problem, even though you cleaned it up, or a mechanical problem in the socket that is preventing the terminals from making contact with the bulb.

4. You have loose, dirty connections at the horn relay.
Remove all wires, clean all terminals, and replace and SOLDER any that appear loose or are not soldered properly.

- Eric

 

The parking lamp doesn't light at any time. Either while the parking lamps are lit, or when the headlamps are on. I cleaned the ground to the parking lamp. I cleaned the horn relay terminals. Still NO light on the driver's side parking lamp. I'm thinking it is a failure of that socket. Although when I use a tester on the bad lamp socket with the directional on, I get a reading that goes from zero to a higher number on the meter, say 9 to 12 as if it is blinking. Sometimes when you sit down and think a bit instead of throwing parts at something you can figure it out. I'm going to try changing out the turn signal flasher because I remember that side blinking slower than the other. It may have given up the ghost. But why would the pass side blink and work properly if the flasher was bad? It's a very cheap part and easy to replace, so.
I did check the tail lamp bulbs and they are all AOK.
My money is on the bulb socket being junk.

 

Since I can't reach this or see it cleanly, I don't know if these just pop out like the rears or not. Do they? Because if that's the case I bet if I clean it, it will work just fine.

 

From everything that you've said, it sounds like the socket to me.

If I recall, these sockets are swaged onto the backs of the lamp assemblies, but they can be removed, and you can get replacements from the auto parts store.

Most likely failure mode is broken pressure spring(s) behind the terminals.

- Eric

 

Yer about to find out.

 

Have you tried to push on the wires at the back of of the lamp assy? I've found that the wires are getting a bit brittle and the contacts corrode and won't move back and forth.

 

you can free up the contacts and spring in the socket w wd40 + you can check the socket ground by probing the sidewall of the socket and a known good ground like the bumper if you get continuity its good.

my BU light stopped working in the end i slightly twisted the swaged in part of the socket because it didnt have ground twisitng it slightly allowed it to make contact and not loosen the swaging.

 

I tried to figure out how to get to the back of this socket. I take it there is no easy way. The whole assembly is in fantastic shape. That doesn't mean it can't have some corrosion somewhere. Looking into it from the front of the car, the springs in the lamp are in great shape. They work perfectly. Like new. I'm going to try the pushing of the wires tomorrow night. I messed with it quite a bit tonight and am bushed.
So while messing with it I found out why the car stalled. The last guy to put the wiring to the fuse block didn't, couldn't tighten the wire block to the firewall. The screw doesn't fit correctly so they just pushed it together! I'll put a bigger bolt in there tomorrow and get that tightened up. Sheesh.
If I can't get the lamp to work, what the heck is my next move? I HAVE to get to that bulb socket.

 

When i restored my turn singnals i cut the old sockets out and epoxied new ones in from dorman. Does not look factory stock but works good and cleaned up well.

When all else fails i just use my finger LOL.

 

Which one?

- Eric

 

The middle one lol

 

 

Ha ha ha!

That reminds me of a young woman I used to "see" sometimes, when I was slightly younger, many years ago, who was, um, not completely "sane," but lots of, um, "fun."

One night, she was sitting on the back of my Harley on the way home from an evening out, and she asked me to ride down a certain street. As we rode along, I felt some movement, looked back, and saw her doing essentially the same thing.
She explained that we had passed her ex-boyfriend's house.

Oh, brother.

- Eric

 

I think I knew her.

 

Holy Moly. So to fix the fuse block bolt, I had to put a big lag bolt in it. There was no nut on the fuse block inside the car. I guess the last person to work on that just figured, "Well, the bolt won't thread so we'll just push this extremely important connection together and hope it stays together." I reamed out the block on the engine side to accept the big lag bolt and screwed it together gently. All good.
I removed the battery and put jumper cables onto the terminals to the battery so I could see if the lamp would light if I push/pulled the wires. What do you know? The lamp lit! I couldn't get it to flash though. So, I go to the trunk and figure out one of the rear bulbs was not grounded in its socket correctly. Everything works now. Thanks for all the input and advice. Much appreciated. It surprised me that this car could fail in so many ways so quickly. First the brake booster, then when I was changing that, the engine side fuse block loosened up causing a stall and lights not working. But like I said, all good now. It was a mental game and then a PITa to fix.

 

Wow. That's a lot of stuff. I'm glad you got it figured out!

It does seem to fall into the "whatever you messed with last" category, though, as you probably loosened the firewall through-plug while you were removing and re-installing the brake booster, which then led to all of the confusion.

I'm sure someone like Inline Tube does sell the proper screw for that, but it looks like you took care of it effectively, so that's really not important.

I hope you enjoy driving it now!

- Eric

 

Glad it all worked out. The trials of old car ownership can be quite testing, but a good feeling when you get it fixed.

 

I drove it for 12(?) years with the screw not threading into anything. Finally, jacking around with the brake booster knocked the link apart. lol.