yuck electrical problem

NSDWS

NSDWS

Member
Man I hate electrical problems. (39 two door standard sedan 6volt) I have tail running lights on right and left, problem is when I step on brake peddle my right tail goes out and brake light does not come on. Left side is all good. This could get long so hang in there. So I looked up under car and saw one wire coming from the housing looping up to a mounting screw and one going to the crossover harness. So I took wire that was on screw and hooked it to the other wire that was in crossover harness. That gave me both tail lights working and both brake lights working but when tail lights are turned on when step on peddle the tail light still goes out, but with tail lights off the brake light will work. See what I mean I hate electrical problems. Ok so now I take the right housing out of car and get good look and see that the housing was pretty much rusted out at one point and someone had put a big glob of bondo in side of it and stuck a bulb socket down in it. My thinking now is that my ground is bad or I have no ground on that side, but if that was the case would the lights not work a all. Prior to the work I did I did not have brake or tail. Am I going in the right direction with this or should I be looking elsewhere? Hope I explained well enough to understand.Thanks Doug
 
I would fix your taillight/bondo situation first, making sure you have good clean solid grounds, then re-asses your problem (or see if that is your problem) with a 6V system grounds are mucho important
 
Run a wire from known good ground(battery pole) to the bulb socket then you get an answer if it´s a bad ground issue.
If you measure voltage between the bulb socket and good ground a higher voltage reading(there´s always a little due to voltage drop in wiring) indicates bad grounding to.
 
Couple things to consider when dealing with dual filament bulbs; if the socket has a bad ground (like mounted in bondo), electricity will ground out thru the other filament and on to ground in another socket; secondly when the other filament is powered it will no longer act as a ground and you end up with no light from that bulb.
 
I would replace the tail light housing with a good one, clean all grounds and I bet the problem will go away. Are you sure the wire that was on the screw wasn't a jury rigged ground to make up for the bondo blob?
 
All of the ground information is good, but you really need to figure out the wiring in general. I would not start by just connecting wires together. :) Trace each wire out one at a time and be sure what is what!
 
I have ordered some new tail light housings and will clean the grounds well before install. The wire that was looped to the housing I am sure was an attempt to make a ground at the expence of either the brake or tail light. Thanks for all the replies.
Doug
 
You just have to remember that the body and frame are your return path ways for good grounding. If there is no electrical connection to the body or frame then the ground path is compromised and the circuit is open. The wiring is generally always a power wire to a load but, as was previously mentioned, you have to know what circuit that power wire is supposed to function by using the OEM wiring diagram. If you electrical wires have deteriorated to the point you can't identify them, it becomes a guessing game plus the chances of a short are much increased with deteriorated insulation on the wires.

I've know several antique cars to catch fire and burn up due to shorts in the electrical wiring with bypassed fuses & circuit breakers.
 
I concur you probably had a ground path through the filaments of one bulb

I just had a problem like that with the front park lights and turn signals on my '98 RV. When I got into it, I found the RH bulb socket was held in place with a large blob of RTV. Must have been a relative of your guy :confused:

The PO had broken the flange in the bucket where the bulb holder bayonets into the bucket. So I replaced both side sockets for new, uncorroded ones, with nice new ground wires, and also repaired the flange (for the next guy) and presto, all is well.
 
Re: yuck electrical problem [update]

Just wanted to thank everyone that replied to post for the help. Just an update it was the tail light housing. The PO I guess decided he wanted just brake lights and put that glob of bondo in the housing to hold the socket in and hooked up the tail light wire as a ground so the brake lights would at least work. I replaced the housing and all is fine. Thanks Doug
 
That's a good result. Hopefully you may approach the next electrical problem with a little more confidence.

Good stuff.

Mart.
 
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