I'm just about an idiot when it comes to electrical. Is there a simple cure for my lack of turn signals on my 73? And before you say look at the electrical diagram....forget it. Too small for my old eyes to read much less figure out.


They use to work, but over time don't anymore. Is there a ground up front for them, relay went bad, fuse. What is a common thing that I might be able to fix?

Any help would be welcome.

Dave

Fuse is first. Check fuses, bulbs, and sockets for corrosion. Clean all the grounds. (There is one in back of each headlight. Rear is under the relay board, I think.)

Do the brake lights and parking lights work? That would mean that those bulbs have a ground at least.

Switch may be faulty. Or unplugged. Do the headlights dim/bright?
Broken, melted wires...

There's no easy cure. You have to get in there, inspect, test, and fix / replace whatever the issue is.

There are larger-format diagrams available. If nothing else, you can have the ones available on-line blown up large and printed. There really is no substitute for reading the diagrams.

--DD

I know you don't want to look at an electrical diagram but there's very little "do this" and it will fix your flasher.

Here's a simplified schematic of the turnsignal/hazard circuit in your car.

First thing, does the 4-way flasher work?

Do the lights even come on with the turnsignal stalk? Front? Rear?

The turn indicator lit up for a few seconds but no front or rear turn signal will come on. The emergency flasher pull switch will flash but nothing else. Looked at the fuses tonight, all looked good.

The only ground I see is by the headlights, which still work.

Dave

I thought I might be onto something. Cleaned the ground wires for the turn signal and changed the turn signal housing with an extra I had. No luck.

There is a connector on the drivers side looks like the power going in with 3 wires that connects to double the number of wires, maybe to the other side? Maybe take that apart.

Dave

The 3 wires are the ones to the headlight motor. Don't know if suppose to have constant power without the headlight switch on but the green and red wires do, both sides. Normal?

Also, the master cylinder only has one connection for a ground not two like the old one. One is just loose, do both need to be grounded?

Did get partial signals to come on, driver side is brighter while the passenger side is very dim. Any suggested solutions?

Dave

Front grounds are by the back of the headlights, rear ground is by the engine relay tray.
also check all the bulbs and sockets for corrosion.

Click to view attachment

Which relay is the emergency? Connected to the turn signals.

Dave

Ground!!!! it drove me nuts bad Ground!!!

It seems that there is a bad relay, stuck open or closed. When I connect the negative of the battery I'm getting some sparks like there is something powered on.

Redid the ground wires on the front passenger side next to the headlight motor, maybe time to do the other side.

Dave

Normal. When the headlight switch is off, it sends power to the "put the light down" circuit. There may be power to another circuit as well when the light is actually in the down position; that acts as a "brake" to stop the light in the right position.




If it only has one connection, the brown/white wire goes on there. That goes to the "YOUR BRAKES HAVE FAILED" blinking light in the combo gauge. The single-pole sender is grounded through its threads, while the two-pole sender takes a brown ground wire on the other pole.

Tie the plain brown wire up out of the way, in case you ever wind up with a two-pole sender in the car again.




Check the ground path for both lights. Sometimes a bad ground will force one light to ground through the other, making one bright and one dim. I had that problem with my headlights once.

--DD

Thanks DD for your responses, much appreciated.

Dave

Couldn't it be at the steering column? Remove the wheel and clean/check the contacts?

Paul

Another turn of events...was running the engine and my grandson was in the car asking me to turn on the lights. I turned them on and thought that was kind of strange, the driver's side went up with a slight delay followed by another delay then the passenger side. Then about 30 seconds later, there starts smoke coming from the dash area. Oh crap...shut it down and disconnect the negative side of the battery.

I pulled the light switch and there was two wires (two into one, grey with red stripe and the other one red) with insulation burned away and touching at one point.

What could have caused this, too much resistance on old wire, bad relay???

It would be nice to actually drive this but don't know where to go from here.

Dave

a picture.

Click to view attachment

Dave