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Electrical Gremlins


jerryasi

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I’ve been challenged by my turn signals, 4-way flashers and city/running (one click out on the headlight switch). I installed the LED (Blunt) taillights, have installed the Euro front turn indicators and retrofitted sockets that light a 1157 and installed the Sirius xg amber 1157 bulbs. So, with the introduction of all the LED I opted for NAPA EL 13 flasher, it produced a measured “pulse” not a distinctive flash, so I went to the recommended NAPA EL13A1, great snappy flash, with ignition off all lights off running just the 4 ways great flash front and back. Turn on the first click of the headlight switch and the front signals just steady bright. When I turn the key to “run” to operate the turn signals same thing, RT & Left signal work great front and rear, but when I pull that first click on the headlight switch, the front Left goes steady bright the RT front signal has a slight (very faint) pulse. Also, when the turn signal switch is in the neutral position, the flasher gives an audible squawk in sync with the dash turn indictor light. I’ve cut both leads to the turn signals so that I could manually check the wires independently. On the “light” side, I get a slightly dimmer on one side, and a brighter on the other, on wire/power side I get both the steady and the blink. What am I overlooking?

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You don't say what year your car is, but from the picture I'm guessing a '72 or 73.  If that's the case, there are only two places where current from the turn signals and current from the parking lights are close to each other:  in those 1157 front turn signal bulbs.  They were originally dual filament incandescents, lower wattage is parking, higher is turn signal.  The other place is the turn signal lever.  On US spec 72 and 73 cars, selecting a left or right turn with the lever and the ignition off will illuminate the appropriate parking and tail light.  This is required for on-street parking in many European countries, and for some reason those two year US '02s have the feature functioning.   

 

Recall that turn signals operate only with the ignition on, and parking/tail lights work with or without the ignition on.  There are two sets of contacts in the emergency flasher switch, one to energize the emergency flashers, the other to power the turn signals. 

 

So my guess is that either the LED front turn signal bulbs are somehow back-feeding between the two circuits, or the contacts in the turn signal lever are cross-feeding.  A distant third guess would be a misbehaving emergency flasher switch, but if it has been working properly before, it's probably still OK.  And nothing in that switch goes to either front parking or tail lights.

 

Easiest thing to try first is reinstall the incandescent 1157 bulbs in the front parking lights and see if that cures the problem.  Make sure those turn signal housings are properly grounded--they ground through the mounting screws.  If that doesn't help,you'll need to troubleshoot the turn signal lever itself.  The factory wiring diagram will identify which terminal does what so look for continuity between the turn signal terminals and the on-street night parking terminals.  

 

That's all I've got...

 

mike

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'69 Nevada sunroof-Wolfgang-bought new
'73 Sahara sunroof-Ludwig-since '78
'91 Brillantrot 318is sunroof-Georg Friederich 
Fiat Topolini (Benito & Luigi), Renault 4CVs (Anatole, Lucky Pierre, Brigette) & Kermit, the Bugeye Sprite

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  • 1 month later...

Late to the party, I ran into a bunch of weird little problems popped up when I did the same retrofit. One thing I found that helped was running a ground from the front turn signal housings. Stock they rely on the two screws to ground the assembly, but I found that the lower voltage draw was not happy with the ground. Also check all of the items of of mikes list

 

E5BAB474-AC9D-4842-93A5-097B2594C042.jpeg

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