I had a brake light switch failure on my 59 chevy truck yesterday. It stuck "on", which is kind of strange for these. It's the lever type switch, and I've replaced it a few times over the 44 years I've had the truck. This was an old stock Standard Motor Products SLS-43 switch. The failure was apparently due to lack of lubrication...the shaft seized in the housing, and then broke apart as I removed the switch. The new replacement got a drop of oil on the shaft...I guess the one that failed, might have been lubricated when it was made a long time ago, but that went away. Old parts are neat, but you gotta remember their limitations.
that is incredibly clean for an old broken part exposed to the elements. Being in AZ, you may not be aware that that part would have looked like it was brought up from a ship wreck on a deep sea dive here in the swamp. yeah, oil is a good thing too
Hey squirrel , I've been daily driving my 56 pick up for 9 years now...I have broken 4 of those switches in exactly the same way . The original switch that was on it lasted the longest , the others came from NAPA the one on it now is an NOS one. we will see how long it last's.
On a more realistic thought, many times the original would have had an oilite, or bronze bushing on the shaft, and a NORS part may not have that. I like to buy old NOS, if you can find it, and NORS stuff off ebay. Quite often its a good price, but just because it was made in the 50's or 60's does not mean its the same quality of the OEM part
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