When I turn on my right turn signal the fuse blows (left works fine). This happened the second time I drove it this year.

Here is what I am doing, if anyone has any suggestions I would like to hear them.

1) disconnected the wiring from the front and rear indicators,
2) removed the flasher relay,
3) removed the right side signal wiring from the emergency flasher

and it still indicates a short in the wiring (or course there is still a bulb in line).

To do tomorrow:
4) remove the wiring from the turn signal indicator (or remove the bulb) in the dash (needed to fix the speedo anyway).
5) That should leave me with only the turn signal switch. I removed the steering wheel (always nice to have the proper size socket ahead of time -- I asked my family to get me one for xmas last year and they did). Is there a secret to removing the turn signal switch from the steering column? I haven't attemtped it yet but will tomorrow. With everything disconnected I should only have wiring to look at.

If the wiring shows no shorts, then it is either the turn signal indicator or the turn signal switch. I would suspect the switch.

If there is a short then I have to divide the wiring up between the front and the back. Is there any connectors that can be disconnected that will separate the turn signal wiring front to back?

Thanks for any help you can give me.

Mike

I forgot to say that I have replaced the flasher and still had the same problem.

Sounds like you're on a logical troubleshooting path...the front and rear wires are crimped into the same connector at the hazard switch... I would start there before pulling the column apart

Do you have any wiring that looks like this?

[/quote]
3) removed the right side signal wiring from the emergency flasher

and it still indicates a short in the wiring (or course there is still a bulb in line).

[quote]

with (3) from above done you say there is still a short. If the bulb is the only path to ground the fuse wont blow. did you try using the turn signal in this state to see if the fuse would still blow?

I had a similar problem once after I replaced the dash face material. when I put the emergency flasher back in, a terminal was shorting to the dash frame so that whenever I signaled a rt turn a fuse would blow (8 or 9 - forgot which). when this happened, the alt lite would come on faintly. when braking, all gauges would zero and alt lite would be bright. all this made the diagnosis more difficult. good luck!

No I didn't try this. I wouldn't expect the turn signal to light when the flasher was removed but I could be mistaken.

I didn't expect the fuse to blow when a bulb in if that was the problem. I expect to find a short someplace (turn signal switch, etc)

Thanks for the reply.

I saw where the front and rear wires were crimped into the same connector but was hoping there was another place. The wiring looks pretty good on the car.

Thanks for your input.

Mike

here is what I have done in addition to the above:

1) split the wires, checked for continuity and shorts (no problems),
2) checked wiring to turn signal switch (good),
3) checked turn signal switch (good). Checked that the wire had no shorts and that when the switch was in the correction position I have continuity .
4) looked at wiring to switch and found that a ground had some cuts on it (reason unknown) but the wire was not exposed, a bit of tape will take care of it (I would add shrink tubing but I don't want to cut the wire - hmm if I can get the terminal out of the connector I can use the shrink tube).

Left to do:
1) indicator light - check wire and light
2) new turn signal switch (see if there is some other problem in the switch)
3) emergency flasher switch

Before I do that I am going to hook back up the turn signal switch to see if the fuse still blows. If not I will then add back each leg of the wiring I split apart to see if it blows.

My thought right now are that the wiring seems to be good, the turn signal switch seems to be good but I will find out this weekend. I don't have another emergency flasher switch to replace so does anyone know if there is a VW replacement switch part number?

Thoughts anyone?

I finally found the problems and the 914 is back on the road.

The first problem was one that the PO had also found and put in a temp fix. Inside the turn signal switch the wires are soldered to a board. Normally the wires are routed so that they will not come in contact with the wiper switch. In this case the wire had been twisted so that it would contact the wiper switch when the both switches were installed and screwed down.

The PO put a small piece of electrical tape over the connection thereby preventing the short from happening. Over time the vibration in the steering wheel caused the wire to wear through the tape causing the short.

When I pulled the switch and checked it everthing was good. When I reinstalled it (before I knew what was happening) and tightened the screws, it failed. I could have just put a piece of tape over it like the PO did but I put in a different switch. I will repair this one and keep it as a spare.

Another problem was the right rear turn signal socket. It's ground was corroded so the bulb would not work. Also fixed this.

I also found that left side blinker wire was almost pulled out from the connector that connects to the turn signal switch. I pushed it back in (need to get a replacement terminal or connector) and that seemed to fix a problem with the left side turn signal indicator.

One more thing to look at, I think the PO reversed the wires for the left turn signal/parking light. Looking at the two blinkers, the right is much brighter than the left. With the parking lights on the left is brighter. They had indicated a problem with the left blinker and attempted a repair.

The main thing is that I have my teener back on the road. Just need to change the shocks (bilsteins) and adjust the valves.

You may be asking yourself, why is this guy writing all this junk. The reason is that it may help someone else in trouble shooting their problem.

So I have enough.

Mike

Hey Ya'll this is you are supposed to trouble shoot wiring. Perfect text book logical and then by sheer dumb luck you find out what the DAPO did.

I have been down this path many a times.

Nice job glad yougot it going.