Electric Problems - Taillight OK, Break Not, Headlight OK, Highb Beam not,..

[HighPressure]

Hi!

I read already a lot of Threads here and via Google and was trying today a lot to check and fix.

I hope someone of you can help me on:


When I turn on the Lights by using the Headlight Knob, my Headlight and my Parking light work, aswell as my taillight. All Position lights / Turn Signals work.

But:
NONE of the Bulbs in the Dash, nor the two who are not directly connected to the cirtuit board light up, only the bulb in the heater / a/c control lights up.

When I push the Break Pedal, the break light does not turn on.

When I pull the washer switch to turn on the high beam, nothing happens.
This one does not give me some click or response, maybe that one is bad?


I read some threads and someone said the only position where all these cables connect is the headlight knob.
So i unscrewed it and disconnected the cable.
I took a multimeter and checked the pins.. that one on the picture has no voltage and the other one 0.30
They are rather rusty.. do you thinkt his could be the reason for this?



the connector that I marked with NO VOLTAGE is a dark brown cable.
One goes into a cable hose and one has a plug-connector which is not connected to anything. this cable is about 15 cm long (6 inch)


the fuses seem to be all ok and strong enough.


further,... my circuit board is very rusty and oxidated.
The Gauges, except the Voltage and the Speedometer do not work. They are not stuck. I can move them by hand
Do you think this comes from the circuit board?
what would I do, except replacing it ?
I live in Europe and its rather hard and expensive to get a fitting swap part

Would be great if someone has any Ideas whats wrong or to tell me how to figure out whats wrong.

Thanks !!

 

[Slade001]

Number one: CHECK ALL YOUR GROUNDS. There is a grounding block on the drivers side under the dash above the emergency brake pedal. Make sure that is clean and well seated. Check all grounds under the hood.
Try cleaning all of the contact points on your circuit board. Take a pencil eraser and clean all the points then go over them all again with a cotton swap and rubbing alcohol. Make sure that all your bulbs are good and that the little feet on the bulb sockets are making contact. This worked wonders for my dash lights.
The bulb for your tail lights is a dual filament bulb. Change the bulbs and see if that fixes it. You can also change out the headlight switch, they get covered in dust and grime and just wear out. You've obviously figured out how to remove the switch from the dash (ie. taking voltage readings) thats the toughest part of changing it out. Hope this helps you out.

 

[HighPressure]

Hi!

Today I swappes the headlight switch.. No change at all :\ but it was very dirty and oxidated aswell as rather rusty inside..

I checked the grouding block with the multimeter.. Seems to be good, but also lot of rust on it.
There is one cable disconnected. Its a brown with a white stripe on it and seems to go to the engine bay? I connected it, but did not change anything, so i disconnected it again, as mine was a tbi before.

The dark brown cable from the light switch leads to a dead end .. A connector cable wich has an orange and the dark brown cable. It was located near the radio.


Tomorrow Im gonna check the other groundings and maybe try to swap the ground block at the drivers side.

Thanks so far for your help

 

[rampage]

I checked the grouding block with the multimeter.. Seems to be good, but also lot of rust on it.

Just an FYI: I'm sure this isn't your problem but just because your meter reads 0Ω, has a low resistance, or has continuity doesn't mean that the cable is good. When the cable is corroded badly it cuts down the current it can carry (i.e. voltage drop across the ends of the wire) due to the resistance of the corrosion. Think of when a battery cable is corroded and the starter is having trouble spinning the motor over.

If the cable looks bad then replace it, it's not helping matters any and can only create problems later.

 

[HighPressure]

Thanks again for all the replies.. here a little follow up of what I found and did at the last weekend:


- High Beam not working:

At the Steering column on the left hand, half way under the dash, is mounted the control switch button for the high beam. this is pressed by a piece of metal rod which leads up to the steering wheel and is just broke in my case.
Thats the reason why the light does not turn

By the way, I did also swap the head light control.. did not change anything, but wouldnt have held for very long time (was very oxidated and rusty inside)


- Break light do not turn on, while turn lights & side markers work:

The previous owner installed a new button for the hazard warning light.. one cable was not connected and hanging loose underneath the dashboard.
All in all it is a quick and dirty job what they have done there.. so I will recable this clean.


- Dash Lights do not work

As Slade said, the groundings are bad in my car.. a lot of rust even behind the dashboard. I unmounted the grounding block on the drivers side and rebuilt it from a piece of metal sheet / brass and cutted it with the dremel to look like the original part. Further I cleaned with the dremel and the sanding head all the parts and sprayed zinc on it. When it was dry I reconnected everything and sprayed WD40 between it.

Further, my fusebox had 3 fuses which seemed to be good, but the multimeter said 1Ω, so I swapped them too.. then I also realized that one of the connectors in the fuse box itself was broke.

I thought it might be a good idea to do this to all groundings I could find in the engine bay.. found so far about 5 Points (most on the passenger side), which I all cleaned, zinced, reconnected, sprayd WD40..

When I measured the rear of the dash, I realized that the "electric board" wasnt good anymore, because at the point where the Connector is plugged, the electric connectors are broke :\ so I need a new one


- Horn does not work

I unmounted the horn button from the steering wheel and realized that it wasnt connected to the plug, and so it could not work anyway..


Thanks once again for your help..
hope this informations can help someone else