odd turn signal happenings

[70Tom]

So all my directionals/turn signals work properly. Front lower. Hood markers. Right and left rear with my headlights OFF. However, when I turn my headlights on, the right rear turn signal blinks oddly. Normally on the 70 Fury III/SF, the first and third lights blink in unison. However, with my lights on, the first and then the third on the right rear signal blink alternatively. Any idea's what's causing this?

I changed out the bulbs, so it's not a bad bulb. I'm guessing it's one of a few possible problems. Turn signal switch is going bad (although it works perfectly fine without the lights on). Bad ground. Flasher relay is wonky. Something wrong with the contact on one of the bulbs.

I'm not sure.

Ideas?

 

[300rag]

My vote is a ground problem, most likely at the right tail light assembly.

 

[70Tom]

That's kind of what it seems like. Now, I guess the question will be, where is the ground for that constant power source when the lights are on. Looking forward to finding that on the wiring diagram. Haha.

 

[BillGrissom]

I don't think any controls are shared between headlights and turn bulbs, so unlikely on the high-side unless you have frayed wires touching (or bulkhead terminals). I agree, that often such cross-talk is in the ground circuit. I doubt you will find ground points detailed on the wiring schematic.

 

[live4theking]

Does it ground through the socket maybe? Try cleaning the socket up some and the hole.

 

[traintech55]

It should ground thru the socket to the housing and then to the bumper. Take it all apart and clean everything. Should be fine then.

 

[70Tom]

Well, I thought it was pretty clean, but I'll admit, I didn't clean out the contact area. I'll have to remove the lens and bulbs again and clean out in there.

 

[Davea Lux]

Well, I thought it was pretty clean, but I'll admit, I didn't clean out the contact area. I'll have to remove the lens and bulbs again and clean out in there.

Try hooking a temporary ground with alligator clips to the bulb socket and the bumper. If it works correctly after this, you have a bad ground connection someplace, most likely where the turn signal housing mounts to the bumper.

Dave

 

[MrMoparCHP]

Anytime you have freshly paint parts like bumper brackets or the body it self you may have grounding issues. Sometimes you may have to scrape some paint away where the screws and bolts make contact.


Alan

 

[Gerald Morris]

Try hooking a temporary ground with alligator clips to the bulb socket and the bumper. If it works correctly after this, you have a bad ground connection someplace, most likely where the turn signal housing mounts to the bumper.

Dave

Exactly what I would have advised. Do this.

 

[Gerald Morris]

Having already made a grounding jumper from the #4 wire connecting my drivers side cylinder head to the battery, across the block to catch the coil, then to the firewall and dash, I'm now thinking it won't hurt to bond from there on back to the bumper, catching points on the body and the gas tank. This might be a good practice to emulate. #12 or 14 AWG stranded copper wire and ring connectors are cheap, while grounding blues can gobble unholy HOURS of one's time.

 

[67Monaco]

definitely a ground issue. That's how I got my feed back from headlights in to the turn signals. Also caused my signals to wig-wag.

 

[Gerald Morris]

NOTE! Last weekend, and the weekend before, I had all kinds of hell chasing down a problem with my running lights, including instruments, license plate light, brake and tail lights, and fog lights. Turn signals still worked. I thought it was the headlight switch, which certainly NEEDED to be replaced. Lights burned almost twice as bright after changing that, and system voltage gained a whole volt at night, even with the hi beams on. But this didn't solve the problem. I found a loose orange wire running toward my glove box. Tightened the spade connector. Coincidentally, the running lights came on then, and I thought, "Ahh, I HOPE this did it..." , and even mentioned this on the Forum. Then, a week later, when I slammed my brakes to avoid hitting a Millennial Mental Midget who zoomed in front of me, I loosened the key fault, which reared its ugly head that nightfall. So I again stood on my head under my steering wheel for another good 90 minutes, carefully testing This and That, poring over the FSM wiring diagrams, to no avail when......

SERENDIPITY!!!

I wiggled the FUSE BOX, which I had taken loose the better to test This and That thereby, ET FIAT LUX! et Lux facta ergo est!

I finally found a LOOSE BRASS RIVET in the original 1965-66 MoPar C-body fuse box which attached the orange line to the headlight switch. This rivet holds the male disconnect connector down to the fuse connector, and had loosened from circuit heat, tension and such over the 52 years it had been in use. Other connections not being much better, I decided to do as I had with my trusty old 1959 International Travellall, which had NO fuse box upon acquisition, and to replace this venerable original relic with a good new SFE glass fuse holder. I found an AIRTEX/WELLS 6G1042 which has a lovely brass bus, screw terminals which will accept either ring or spade terminations for 6 circuits. I also got a cheap Dorman with the same sort of slide disconnects Ma Par favored which I will likely deploy under the hood for some extra stuff now using inline fuses. All my fuses are SFE /AGCglass, as I prefer stuff designed by the Society of Fuse Engineers to cheap modern ATC blade fuses. I can even cut the brass bus bar on the NOS Airtek/Wells fuseblock I got to divide it 4 & 2 for the stuff on the battery and the ignition/Acc switch respectively. I'm converting ALL my instrumentation lights to 12V, which is easy enough since I pulled the old panel with the speedometer, fuel, oil pressure, water temp, and ammeter last year. I might wind up selling that, or eventually putting 12V LEDs in it if I care to ever put it back in.

Anyway, you might replace your fuse box if you can't find anything else wrong, but keep having problems with lights!