wrongturninwv Posted May 13, 2006 Share Posted May 13, 2006 95 Impreza 2dr coupe. Left brake light is dimmer than right. I changed all bulbs and replaced with new ones. Checked wires for bare spots and found none. Bulb sockets are clean inside. I do have a good ground. Right side brake and trunk lid break working fine. Also found when I push down on the brake that you cant see clock light on radio till you let off of it. I unpluged all 3 lights to left side and clock light stays on when brake is pushed down and works fine. What could the problem be. All other lights on car working fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted May 13, 2006 Share Posted May 13, 2006 well somehow you have a voltage leak to ground when that socket is pluged in. Could be the socket is bad, dirty, or voltage is leaking. Does the same thing happen with it pluged in and in the light with the bulb out? nipper Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cougar Posted May 14, 2006 Share Posted May 14, 2006 It sounds to me there is a bad ground connection to the left bulb. The problem may be in the dash area. To see if this is so you can make a long ground jumper lead and place one end on a known good ground connection like the negative side of the battery. Then place the other end on suspected bad ground spots and see if the problem clears. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted May 14, 2006 Share Posted May 14, 2006 It sounds to me there is a bad ground connection to the left bulb. The problem may be in the dash area. To see if this is so you can make a long ground jumper lead and place one end on a known good ground connection like the negative side of the battery. Then place the other end on suspected bad ground spots and see if the problem clears. Tail lights ground out at the trunk. But did anyone check the front lights to see what they are doing? nipper Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cougar Posted May 14, 2006 Share Posted May 14, 2006 Tail lights ground out at the trunk. But did anyone check the front lights to see what they are doing? nipper You are correct Nipper and I was aware of that. Since this is a strange problem, with the radio illumination being involved, I did a little research into this. I was not aware of how the radio illumination circuit is designed and this may be why things are doing what they are. It appears the light for the radio is directly tied to power through the tail illumination relay and fuse 9 in the power distribution in the engine compartment. The other side of the light then goes to the illumination control module. The brake lights are tied to power through fuse 12 and the brake light switch. The brake and other tail lights share a common ground. The other tail lights are tied to power through the tail illumination relay along with the radio light. If the left rear lighting common ground connection was bad then the circuit may be backfeeding somehow and "leaking" as you suspected. By checking the voltage of the suspected bad ground of the left tail light with reference to a known good ground point or, making the ground jumper as I stated earlier, would tell if this was true or not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted May 14, 2006 Share Posted May 14, 2006 Its amazing how odd things are wired at times. I would think the radio would be wired to the dash lights. Seems we are getting closer and closer to where you honk the horn the wipers come on (ford escorts not included). nipper Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cougar Posted May 14, 2006 Share Posted May 14, 2006 Yeah. We just can't assume that everything is wired together like it was in "the old days". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted May 14, 2006 Share Posted May 14, 2006 i am ready to welcome full multiplexing, would probably make finding a wireing issue SO much more easier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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