Young69Owner

Hello All,
My '69 has 4 wires coming out of the foot switch. The two greens should go to the high beams. The blue has a tendency to be the indicator light and the brown should be the power from the low beams. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

-Adam

...Roger...

No I can't confirm that. Where is your power to the dimmer switch ?
One of the greens goes to the high beams and one goes to high beam indicator
The tan is low beam
The blue feeds the dimmer from the headlight switch

Young69Owner

Really? What does the dimmer have to do with the high beams?

Clams Canino

Quite obviously - It turns them on and off.

Seems to me the only disagreement is if it's fed +12 from the low beam circuit, or from a seperate feed.

-W

Young69Owner

The brown wire has to get +12V from the low beam circuit. Nothing else would make any sense. I really don't understand what the dimmer has to do with the high beams. The only dimmer I know about is for the gauge lights. Can you explain this for me?

Clams Canino

The low/high beam switch is called "the dimmer switch" in general parlance.

The guage light dimmer rheostat is part of the headlight switch.

-W

Young69Owner

so:

green is high beams and indicator

blue is switched +12V

tan is low beams

I will test this by unplugging the wires and testing the low beams. Thanks for your patience.

...Roger...

Sounds like you got it.
Power comes into the foot switch on the blue and goes out by either the tan (low)or green (high).
You can jumper from the blue to either the tan or green to test.

Young69Owner

Thanks a bunch. Next time I'll know what is meant by dimmer switch. My relays are all made and ready to go in. Wish me luck!

...Roger...

Dimmer might be an old fart thing. Years ago we "dimmed" our lights when we saw other lights coming down the road (some cars had automatic dimmers....really they did) so as to not blind the oncoming driver , that doesn't seem to be as common nowadays. (especially when I'm down in Florida,all the grayhairs just leave their brights on all the time)
"Next time" I will try to stay with your terminology (foot switch)from your OP.
GOOD LUCK.....

Young69Owner

I actually feel more educated saying dimmer switch. I have the blue wire going to the tan wire and the dimmer switch is powered off of a 'bus' that goes to the alternator. It is a thing of beauty. I can use all 4 Cibie headlights now. Thanks a bunch!

...Roger...

So when you pull the headlight switch the low beams come on and the dimmer powers the high beams without going through the HL switch ?

Clams Canino

That's the whole idea of the relay.
The dimmer powers the relay and the current draw of the high beams doesn't flow though the HL switch nor the dimmer switch.

-W

...Roger...

What I really meant to say was , the HL switch turns the low beams on and off and the dimmer switch turns the high beams on and off which means that if both are on he would have 6 filaments lit up.

He said bus , I didn't take that as a relay but rather just a connection to the red on the back of the alt. Could be wrong though.

Clams Canino

You say that like it's a bad thing.

And I think his bus goes to a relay - I think.

-W

Young69Owner

Hey fellas; I'm happy to clear this up. I have one additional +12V and one additional ground wire going to my alternator. I've made buses with screws on the side of my engine compartment. All of my new grounds and power wires go to these buses. My headlight switch now sends 200 mA to a Hella headlight relay which moves and completes a circuit. I have a new power wire going from a bus to the old 'dimmer' switch, which is now just a high beam switch. It activates another relay for my high beams. I have Cibie CSR headlights and that means two high beams and two low beams. I do technically have six filaments because of my city driving lights. I am very excited about this setup and grateful for your patience in teaching me. I used a piezo-electric buzzer as my continuity tester and everything you guys said was right on the money.

...Roger...

6 filaments lit ? Never tried that,will the sealed beam take it , cause in the stock setup only 4 filaments , 1 in each bulb is lit on high ? I would have thought lighting both filaments in the low beam with them so close to each other might create too much heat and cause them to burn out.

...Roger...

Ah relays...Cam was correct ...Let there be light !!!

Clams Canino

Dood.. I've a '68 since '78 and I might yet learn something here from you...

So as I understand it... your headlight switch just fires off the low beams, and the foot switch just fires off the high beams - both via relay?
Does that mean you can turn on the high beams with the foot switch when the headlight switch is off? Are they that independant?

Also - Why do you have 6 and not 8 filiments running when both lights are on?

Young69Owner

I'd be a pleasure to help. I made it this far because of you guys. Yes to everything. The low beams have one filament on each side as do the high beams. My serious lights only get 4 filaments because of this. I have one wimpy 6 Watt parking light in with each low beam that make my total 6 filaments. (I also have LED/DRL turn signals, but those aren't filaments and the DRL module has more relays.) Those lights can stay on together all day. My high beams are yellow because that's all Daniel Stern had left and I can turn them on with the headlights down and look nasty.

Also, the bozo previous owner ran all the wires and hoses above the radiator. Today, I saw the detent to the side of it. Where did you run your hoses and wires? Should I move all of them..?