Darn Parking Lights!

[Just Send It]

Gents...I am stumped and I'm looking for some help.



Here's what's going on...



1972 Scamp. The car was completely rewired using an EZ Wiring 21 kit. I retained the OEM rear harness configuration for simplicity. All of the headlights, directionals, and brake lights work as they should. But I cannot figure out the Parking Lights situation.

Right now, when I press the brake pedal the rear Parking Lights turn on with the Tail Lights. When I hit the directionals (without pushing the brake), the Parking Lights stay off and the Tail Lights will flash brightly like normal. But when I push the brake pedal, both the Brake Lights and Parking Lights turn on together.

This tells me that the Parking Lights are being fed continuous current along with the Brake wire.



There is 1 black wire at the connector that splits and feeds the both the Tail Lights and the Parking lights when the headlight switch is activated.






My diagram shows a pink power wire that comes off of the brake switch and goes into the dome light?



This is where I'm confused. If the black wires that are split power the Tail + Parking lights, how does power get to just the Brake Lights without turning the Parking Lights on? It almost feels like there is a wire missing from the diagram that feeds into the other side of the 1157 bubs. Unless I'm totally misreading the schematic.

Any help is appreciated

 

[67Dart273]

It might be as simple as grounds. Stab a meter into the metal of the socket shell and the other probe to a known ground like the engine block. If you are in the rear, something like the trunk latch bolts are a good ground, just get to "bare" metal. With the lamps energized, exhibiting the problem, you should read NO voltage between the lamp shell and body ground

Otherwise, might be something crossed/ crimped (pinched) /. melted in the harness. If you can disable/ isolate the circuits by pulling fuses, then inject power back in at some point that might at least tell you that very thing is happening.

The only common thing really, between park/ tail and stop/ turn is the bulbs themselves

 

[Dana67Dart]

The bulb has 2 filaments.

The black wire feeds one filament.

The green wire feeds the other filament.

There is a common ground between the two.

If the ground is not there odd things can happen.

The turn and tail and brake light and fladher switching happens in combination with the brake pedal switch, the turn signal switch and the flasher switch.


This is from 67 dart wiring diag so things might be a bit different on yours.

The pink wire you point to basically does this....

Black wire from the alternator to the main splice.
Main splice to the fuse block
Fuse block to the pink wires
1 of the pink wares powered the dome light cir.
The other pink goes to the e flasher the to the brake switch
From the brake switch a white wire takes power to the turn signal switch and to the flasher switch.

 

[67Dart273]

As an "old guy" the older Chevs some models had part of the tail lamps in the trunk lid. Those were sources for all kinds of hilarious light shows because of socket grounding problems

 

[Just Send It]

As an "old guy" the older Chevs some models had part of the tail lamps in the trunk lid. Those were sources for all kinds of hilarious light shows because of socket grounding problems

Lol. I bet! I really appreciate you helping me with this. I'll give this a go in the AM.

 

[Dana67Dart]

EZ Wiring 21 kit

I think EZ and Painless need to change their names.

 

[Dana67Dart]

If the ground is not there odd things can happen

Back in the day I worked in Facility Operations. We had Steelcase cubicals.

The way they were powered was by a connector that attached to 5 or 6 pins on one panel to pins on the next.

The system used 3 lines per panel, L1,L2, G, L3, N.

When the connector was cocked the L1 and L2 would still be connected but L3 and N would not.

This effectively fed 208 to anything plugged in into L1 and L2 ( think series)

One day we got a call that 4 or 5 personal clock radios, calculates, and a PC had smoked.

Turns out the power being in series used the lower wattage devices as fuses for the higher wattage devices.

Imagine tracing that one out. Not to mention finding 120v on the neutral to ground.

 

[pt70]

Disregard the dome light. It has it's own feed wire.

When you pull the light switch out one notch, all the parking lights, side lights, and license plate lights should go on. [the rear parking lights are also called taillights]. This system is independent of stop and blinker lights in your car.

The blinker lights are fed thru the ignition switch. The stop light feed is always hot. The stop light wiring goes thru the blinker switch. Normally both bulbs turn on. When the switch is moved to either position; the contacts are broken for that side.

Check for a single filament bulb instead of an 1157.

 

[Just Send It]

The bulb has 2 filaments.

The black wire feeds one filament.

The green wire feeds the other filament.

There is a common ground between the two.

If the ground is not there odd things can happen.

The turn and tail and brake light and fladher switching happens in combination with the brake pedal switch, the turn signal switch and the flasher switch.


This is from 67 dart wiring diag so things might be a bit different on yours.

The pink wire you point to basically does this....

Black wire from the alternator to the main splice.
Main splice to the fuse block
Fuse block to the pink wires
1 of the pink wares powered the dome light cir.
The other pink goes to the e flasher the to the brake switch
From the brake switch a white wire takes power to the turn signal switch and to the flasher switch.


View attachment 1715873133

Good news. Parking lights are working now! Turns out my headlight switch wasn't wired correctly. Now I have 12v going from the headight switch to the Parking lights when I pull the lever. I also had a bad ground which I fixed.

But now my brake lights aren't working. When I was setting up the EZ kit, my dumbass used the Third Brake wire (orange) to power the brake switch instead of the white wire from the column.

My question is, should the White wire coming out of the column be providing 12v when the key is on? I'm only getting 0.3v on my multimeter. The Third Brake wire (orange) from the EZ kit has 12v when keyed-on and that worked before. I'm assuming the White wire should be the same?

Here is the white wire in question



Thanks again

 

[67Dart273]

White wire is not power TO the switch, white to the column is output of the switch TO the column, think "how they work."

When the column TS switch is centered, both turn lamps are connected together and to the white in the TS switch. The brake switch gets fused "full time hot" power, and when you tromp on the pedal, the switch sends power to the white which routes through the switch to both rear lamps

When you talk about EZ you must be descriptive. Without having an EZ diagram, I've no idea what orange does

 

[Just Send It]

White wire is not power TO the switch, white to the column is output of the switch TO the column, think "how they work."

When the column TS switch is centered, both turn lamps are connected together and to the white in the TS switch. The brake switch gets fused "full time hot" power, and when you tromp on the pedal, the switch sends power to the white which routes through the switch to both rear lamps

When you talk about EZ you must be descriptive. Without having an EZ diagram, I've no idea what orange does

You are a fricken genius!!! That worked! All I did was put the 12v output from the brake switch to the White wire in the column and the brakes worked perfectly.

I cannot thank you enough. Seriously. I've been perusing this forum for over a year trying to work up the nerve to rewire this vehicle. I've read so my posts where you chimed in to help folks. You always go out of your way to help people. You're a good guy.

 

[Dana67Dart]

cannot thank you enough. Seriously. I've been perusing this forum for over a year trying to work up the nerve to rewire this vehicle

IMHO rewiring a car with a Painless or EZ kit is a mistake. Get an OEM type kit so it is plug and play, rather than crimp and pray.

Glad you got it all worked out.

On a side note... One of the most important things to do when tracing wires out is start at the alternator (it is the source of all power to the car) and trace back from there.

And know that the fuse block is not always the source of power to devices.

 

[67Dart273]

You are a fricken genius!!! That worked! All I did was put the 12v output from the brake switch to the White wire in the column and the brakes worked perfectly.

I cannot thank you enough. Seriously. I've been perusing this forum for over a year trying to work up the nerve to rewire this vehicle. I've read so my posts where you chimed in to help folks. You always go out of your way to help people. You're a good guy.

Thanks, I'm old. I'm 73, and owned my first RR, a 69 in about 1971 Wiring just comes easy for me