recips

I bought a '60 back in November and have slowly been working through a few issues that the car had. The last one involves the passenger rear tail light. It works fine when the parking lights are on but goes out (completely out) if either the brake is pressed or the turn signal is engaged. All other lights function properly and even the passenger front turn signal works as it should. Before I go prodding and pulling I would like to know what a few of you have experienced. Thanks, Eric

mmaturo

Not much help here but my car does something similar but it is only the turn signal that messes up mine and takes out the brake light and not the taillight completely. The detent or return after a signal using the stalk doesn't work so if I use it I must manually put the stalk exactly in the center of its movement or I will have a rear brake light out in my case. Previous owner told me he replaced the switch a few times but it always failed. So my case is not at the taillight but at the stalk. Yours seems to be a relay with anything that tries to brighten the bulb that is used for the brake and turn signal. I would play with the lamp/light itself to start but i'm a true amateur here.

65GGvert

Do the brake light and turn signal work normally when the headlights are off? It sounds very much like you have a bad ground on the socket, or the wrong bulb in the socket. If the brass base of the bulb isn't making good contact with the side of the socket where it mounts in, it can also cause the lights to do what you describe. To easily check if it's a ground problem, connect a jumper lead from a good ground (bumper?) and touch it to the base of the bulb (the part that the glass is mounted in) and then see if the light works normally. If it does, you're missing a ground on the socket or have a corroded bulb and/or socket.

65GGvert

PS The turn signal switch can kill your brake and t/s light on that side, but it won't make the tail light go out. I just need to make sure the tail lamp itself is working until you push the brake and then it goes out AND the brake light doesn't come on on that side. If that's the case, it's a ground issue as I described

recips

Yes, the tail light works fine until I either press the brake or engage the turn signal. I will check the ground tonight and let you know. Also I see you're in Kannapolis and not far from me, I live in Kings Mountain. Thanks

65GGvert

I have friends and relatives in the Shelby area, I pass through Kings Mtn fairly often, so I can help if you need it.

recips

GG, I am getting erratic and inconsistent operation. Previously I had checked voltage from the socket pins and only got 12 volts when the parking lights were on so when I got home tonight I removed the housing and checked the brass flange that's mounted in the housing to see if there was continuity and didn't like the resistance I was getting. So I drilled and tapped for a 6-32 screw just beside where the flange is wedged into the housing. I covered it all in dielectric grease and installed a screw and nut. I now get continuity and it doesn't affect the socket or bulb so that is eliminated from the equation. Now after monkeying with everything and turning off and on the headlight and turn signal switches many many times i now have tail lights just as before but i also have brake lights when the taillights are off. I even had the turn signal working briefly without the taillights on. It seems to me that maybe I have a bad turn signal switch? What are your thoughts?
Thanks so much for the offer but hopefully i can get through this with your just your advice I also have many friends in Shelby, I've been in KM my entire life and know many families in that area.

recips

Between work and chasing my boys from one sporting event to another I have finally gotten back to this issue. Last week I changed out the turn signal switch and everything works except the passenger brake light when the headlight switch is on. I have also noticed that the passenger brake light is not as bright as the drivers side when the headlight switch is off. Any suggestions? I feel the ground to the socket is good but will listen to anything at this point. Thanks

65GGvert

That sounds like a bad ground, or the bulb in the socket wrong, or wiring not correct.
The tail light and brake light (and turn signal) use the same ground, so it sounds like there's a crossover somewhere reading through the tail light filament before it gets to ground. I feel like it would not be very difficult to run down with a meter and a diagram, but over the net is not so obvious.

recips

Thanks again GG. So if I remove the bulb then that should eliminate the chance for the filament to allow current to flow, correct? I replaced the bulb a few months ago when I started this fiasco. I'll take it all apart tomorrow night and check everything from scratch. I think the violet wire should be the one that handles the signal and brake duties, correct?

65GGvert

There are three wires to that bulb socket. (1157 bulb with two contacts on the bottom and the brass base). The black wire with white stripe is ground for both functions. It grounds via the brass base contacting the inside of the socket sleeve and then to the chassis ground. The black wire is for the tail lights and goes to one of the contacts in the bottom of the socket. The violet wire is for brakes/turn and goes to the other contact. Removing the bulb will not remove power to the two contacts (if tail lights are on or brake/turn activated). The symptoms you describe sound like the contact between the bulb brass base and the bulb holder in the socket is not clean. You can run a jumper from the brass base of the bulb and connect it to the bumper to see if it clears up your problem, if so the ground is bad. I had a similar symptom on the front park/turn socket and it turned out that the internal portion of the socket was rotated within the metal part so that the two contacts were both touching the two contacts on the bulb. All I needed to do was rotate the inner portion to the correct alignment so that when the bulb is inserted and rotated, they were in alignment. Make sure you're using the correct bulb and inserting it in the correct orientation into the socket.
My first test would be to make sure the ground was good between the bulb and the socket.

65GGvert

Just a thought, make sure you don't have the black w/white stripe wire (tail) and black wire (ground) reversed.

recips

GG, I will check everything tonight when I get home from work barring any family commitments that I am currently unaware of. Once again thank you and I will be back in touch. -E

recips

Well, it seems that I have something else going on. In the pic below you can see that I have the 2 pins from the socket pressed against the 2 pins of the bulb and it is illuminated with no ground attached. Once I figured this out I began unwrapping the tape around the wires figuring to find the ground wire had been abraded and was shorting with one of the supply wires but I haven't found anything yet. I have unwrapped past the point of the drivers side tail lamp figuring it had to be past there due to it's functioning properly. Suggestions?

GTOguy

Disconnect the battery and put an ohmmeter lead on one of the pigtail connections and the the other lead to ground. Then check the other one. The connector terminal that has zero resistance is grounded. Look at that one.

65GGvert

I misspoke in my last post. The black wire with white stripe is ground, the black is the tail lamp. I'll edit that. Make sure you have black to the tail filament contact and violet to the brake turn, AND black with white stripe wire to ground. Without the base of the bulb grounded, the voltage will feed through other bulbs in the car and cause multiple issues. You have to have that bulb grounded via the socket for correct operation.

65GGvert

If you have the tail and brake lights wires correctly in the socket, connect a jumper from the bulb base to ground and see if the light works correctly. It sounds like your only issue is a missing ground on the socket.

recips

Ok, I think we have found it. I did what both of you suggested but got no different results. Checking between the black/ white wire I got no resistance again so I assumed that the connection to ground was good. I was wrong! Under load it would fail. I clamped a pair of vice grips to a nut on my bumper and used a jumper to directly short the socket and it seems to be working fine. Evidently one of the connections with the black/ white wire after the drivers tail light is bad. I'm heading back out now to find the culprit. Hopefully this puts an end to this debacle. Thanks so much for the help to all, especially GG!