post turkey flasher/wiper problems

[rdeeble]

Hey folks

hope you all had a good holiday. I am having some problems with intermittent flashers and wipers on my 1976 daily drive - Sometimes its a matter of restarting the car and they both come back on.

I checked the fuse and cleaned the metal tabs but they seem fine.

I also smell a slight rubber or plastic burn from the inside of the car.

The car hasn't had any recent changes except for snow tires, the flasher relay was retrofitted to electronic a year ago using faq instructions here: http://www.bmw2002faq.com/component/option,com_forum/Itemid,57/page,viewtopic/t,327521/highlight,electronic+flasher/

thoughts???

[roadhog0]

Maybe your relay is going bad. My headlight relay is going bad. They were flashing on and off all the way from seattle to issaquah... Lovely

[rdeeble]

that would seem less likely as the relay is only a year old.

[Mike Self]

contain computer chips, turning the car off and back on isn't rebooting 'em. However, it does sound like either a bad ground somewhere, or something the matter in the fuse department.

I know you cleaned the fuses and their clips, but did you carefully inspect the fuses themselves? The ends actually wear through because the fuse metal is much softer than the brass clips.

Make sure your wiper motor ground is OK (brown wire); same with the flasher relay. If your 4 way flashers work normally, then the flasher relay is OK, as the same relay works the turn signals.

You didn't say what year your car is, but on a 6 fuse car, wipers are fuse 6 and turn signals fuse 5; 12 fuse roundie, 12 for wipers, 5 & 6 for turn signals; 12 fuse squarelight, 5 for wiper, 6 for turn signals.

Happy troubleshooting

mike

[rdeeble]

thanks mike - my car is a 76. The tip on the fuses (no pun) is hopeful - I am going to check that out because it does act like a fuse problem. I had check the middle of the fuse and also made sure they were not too loose but I hadn't thought to check the tips.

a ground issue might make sense too. I had actually swapped out my turn signals a while back and I know they have some pretty sensitive ground issues on the screw that keeps the unit in... I wonder if maybe a ground issue there is affecting the overall system.

any thoughts on this burn smell I am experiencing (I turned the heater off as I thought maybe that was the culpret but it still occurs from time to time).

-rd