Can someone show me a good wiring diagram for having tail, brake and turn signals in a single dual filament bulb? Right now I have 2 wires going to the back of my 51; 1 for brakelights, 1 for taillights. I know that wont work, but I cant seem to figure out what I need. I have the painless wiring diagram, but it assumes that you have their kit.
you just need one more wire to the back of the car. one for both tail lights. one for the left brake/ts light one for the right brake/ts light. You need a turn signal switch that has (at least) 6 wires on it.
What you have to do is determine what turn signal switch you're going to use, & with it unplugged from any power source take a continuity tester & test every possible combination with the switch in "off", "left turn", & "right turn" positions. It can be confusing but write it all down & think about it & you'll see how to hook it up. What it basicly does (most of them) is take a "brake in + (positive)" & another "in +" (from the switch "on" circuit) & provide power to both bulbs from the "brake in +" in the "off" position, & power to the turn signal from the "in +" as well as power to the other brake light from the "brake in +" when you have one of the turn signals on. Of course, there are variations depending on the year & make of the car. It's simple. ;^P ~ Paul aka "Tha Driver" You talkin' dirty or hep?
The GM switches used from the mid 50s to the mid 60s have 6 wires. When they added the hazzard flasher, another wire was added for it. 1. Flasher power in 2. Brake power in 3. Right Rear out 4. Left Rear out 5. Right front out 6. left front out 7. Hazzard flasher power in 8. Sometimes the horn wire gets put on the same connector, but it's a separate thing.
In a nutshell all you do is add a scond wire going back the the stop light fcircuit. The idea is that you set up your STOP lights with TWO wires (each with it's own dedicated wire) so that you can use the Bright filament for BOTH stopping and for turnsignals. So you run a Right Stop Wire (will also double as your Right Turn Signal) and a Left Stop Wire (will double as your Left Turn Signal) and lastly a wire for your Parking lights - no need to run two there but I guess you could if you wanted. The easiest way to run this is getting the 7 wire Turn Signal switch, but there are ways to have a OLD 3 wire Turn Signal switch work as well. There is an aftermarket "adapter" that works but all teh ones I have seen DIM your stop light bulbs and frankly that scares me - so I added a couple of relays to do the job where you get full power to the bulbs for Stop Light. You can also easily add a 4 way flasher switch by simply activating BOTH relays at the same time or bypass them altogether and run an actual 4 way switch. I was bound and determined to run an OLD 3 wire turn signal switch and came up with this setup to do it. A little overkill I admit, but I figure it'll work just fine. If you look at the schematic you will see that Normally the brake switch will light BOTH STOP LIGHT bulbs, but they both get power through a set of normally closed contacts via a dedicated relay. By doign it this way when you step on the brake pedal BOTH STOP LIGHTS light up but when you turn your Turn Signal on you FLASH that side STOP LIGHT as your Turn Signal. I hope this makes sense.
I used to own a 59 Jag that had a couple of relays that did that. It was a lot of wires and I couldn't get it to work right, so I replaced the relays and the wiring with a trailer brake light converter. It was a cheap little thing that you use to convert the harness from a vehicle with separate turn signal lamps to a trailer with single stop/turn lamps. I think it was called a 3-wire to 2-wire converter. Anyway, it was real easy. you input the two turn signal lines and brake light on one side and the brake/stop light is output on the other side. I still see them on the rack at parts stores and they are under $20. Now, if you have a GM or Ford steering column, all that switching is done in the column.
Since the question has been answered, I don't mind so much high jacking this thread, especially since my question is related! I have a 63 Rambler with a new (late 80s) GM column in it. I had no problem wiring the turn signals, everything works fine. I'd like to make the hazard lights work though. According to all wiring diagrams I could find, all I had to do was run a wire from the column connector to a flasher, then ground the other leg of the flasher. Well, that didn't work. I don't want to burn up the switch, so I'm reluctant to try running a hot lead to the flasher leg. My understanding is the switch will route the power through the lights, all I'm doing is providing an alternating power source. Is this correct? The car originally had no flashers, of course. I have the factory retrofit switch, but don't want to put hte bilky ting under the dash when I have a neat little switch right there on the steering column.
should just need a (full time, fused, not switched) power wire to the other side of the hazzard flasher unit, then it will work. Ground won't give the lights power, you know.... (if you want, I can scan a GM schematic so you can feel better about it)
here's the 82 pontiac RWD car shop manual wiring diagram for the turn signal switch. The brown wire is what you connect the haz flasher unit to. See, the other side of it goes to power.
I've looked at a few of those style units, but my "problem" with them was that they DULLED the STOP LIGHTS for normal use and then allowed full current (brightening them) for Turn Signal contrast. In lots of ways it was a CHEAP and ELEGANT fix .........but!!!!!! Since I've been nearly rear ended in my old cars already I was hesitant to make the STOP lights any LESS BRIGHT. My other issue (probably not applicable to alot of people) is that this will be set up for my '47 Ford truck that I want to tow with - by using a relay there is no funky issues with hooking up extra lights from the trailer. I realize this is a pretty limited scenario not applying to most. Can you tell me how the $20 unit worked - in terms of brake light intensity??? Was it like I described or was it a BETTER mouse trap. I've seen where they do this with diodes and was under the impression all the cheapy ones worked the same way, but I don't know if that's really accurate or not. Between me and a couple friends we are always looking to run the "OLD" style 3 wire switch but have only the 2 filament rear light bulbs.
blown240, I used "standard" dual contact realys cause I wanted to have my front parking lights double as turn signals as well. The relays I used were scavenged, but I see the exact same ones all over the place - surplus - McMaster etc. I can get more info on them if that'd help.
Ok Squirrel, since you seem to be the master of the turn signals , do you by any chance have a digram of a '55 chevy turn signal switch?
HemiRambler, The turn signal converter worked pretty well and I don't recall any dimming. If anything it was probably brighter because I was able to eliminate a lot of old, funky electrical contacts. BTW, I see that JCWhitney has those for $11.99.
You should be able to do the whole thing without any harness changes. I guess you want the brake lights to flash, overridden by the brake pedal? Or do you want the running light to flash, and not be overridden by the headlights on? You don't want to add the third bulb right? The key is to find out where the bulbs go common. They both always light together now, how far up does each bulb have it's own wire run. If all the way up to the dash all the better. The turn signal switch left right switched wires have to go here. So if your plan is to flash the running lights in the front and back chase wires and let me know, the rest is easy.
I am adding turn signals to a '49 Chevrolet and like the idea of using the 3 to 2 converter. I got a Hopkins brand, part # 48845 and wired a test board to play with it before I wired it in the car. I could not get any output from the converter. I assumed it was defective and purchased another one. The second one shows an output of 9-10 volts (input is 13 volts). even with the 9-10 volt output, the lights will not shine. What am I missing here? Philip
I know this is a really old discussion, but I am looking at this as a solution. Can anyone provide photos of their setup? HemiRambler, I sent you a message about your diagram.
The Jalopy Journal
