Got up at O:Dark Thirty this morning as usual.
Did my Pre-Work routine, as usual.
Gathered up my shit and headed out the door. Just like every other work day for decades.
Got in the Big Red Truck, threw my lunchbox on the seat, slammed the door because the hinge pin bushings are shot and I have been too lazy to replace them, fumbled with the seat belt, fired it up and pulled out the headlight switch to head out.
Except no headlights.
WTF?
They worked fine yesterday all the way to work.
Fumbled around pulling and pushing the switch in and out and still nothing.
Get out and see the tail lights and front parking lights are on. Got back in and tried the High Beams. The headlights came on but only as long as I held the turn signal stalk back in the high beam position. They wouldn’t stay on unless I kept it pulled back against the spring.
Fuck me.
It’s fucking dark and it will be dark long after I get to work.
So I drove all the way in holding the turn signal stalk back.
Get to work, punch in and head to our little hidey hole we call The Shop.
Basically a corner of a huge warehouse fenced in with chain link, a bunch of shelves, desks, cabinets and a sliding door.
Get in the internet, get on Youtube and look up First Generation Dodge Truck, No Headlights.
Several videos appear and I start scrolling, looking to see if there are several with the same issue.
Most common is headlight switch.
I had to wait a couple hours for my local parts store to open. I start work at 6:30 in the morning.
They look it up and don’t have one in stock but they can have it by the afternoon run.
Stop in after work just in time for them to get it out of the truck, $31 and change.
Get home, open the hood and disconnect the battery and then start tearing the instrument cluster bezel off. Fought that sonofabitch for a good twenty minutes after I got all the screws out. It had a bunch of those damn clips around the bottom and I had to pry it out over the steering column without breaking it.
The switch is basically the same as the old Ford ones that I have changed dozens of over the years.
Fiddle fucked around trying to snake it out the bottom between the hood release and the E Brake release. Finally get it out, swap the new one in, re-insert the long triangular stem and knob so I can pull it on and go hook the battery up.
Bigger than shit, the headlights work again.
Fuck around putting it all back together and thanking Jesus that it wasn’t the fucking turn signal switch instead.
The whole time I am sweating my ass off in 90 degree heat but at the same time, thanking Jesus again because it’s supposed to go from 90 today to the low 60’s tomorrow with rain.
It was just plain strange that the old switch shit the bed without any warning what so ever but at least it was a fairly easy repair.
Good job, Phil! I hate doing under-dash work. At least it’ll be easier in the Toyota now that I have the seats out.
Last time mowing the lawn for the year. Go to start the mower and the battery is shot. Jumped with a charger still not going to start. Run to town eight miles away and get a battery install it, hit the key, and nothing. The wire from the battery terminal on the starter to the wire loom is burned off. Replace the wire, ah, the lights come on on the dash. No signal to the starter. Jump the terminals at the starter and it turns over. Pull the steering column apart to check power at the key switch and wiggle some wires prior to checking. The power wire from the starter to the key switch gets hot and starts to melt. Fortunately I hadn’t tightened the ground cable and pulled it off and heard a snap. Fuck it. Winter project. I’ll drag it to the shop later. Get out the other mower and finish up for the year.
Kek! My first thought was turn signal switch!
I’m happy for you because as you allude, that turn signal switch is no fucking fun!!
All I know is for auto electrics there are two types of faults; intermittent, and suddenly.
Since both headlights quit suddenly, and that high beams worked, it can only be the sw commutator.
Seems clear to me. Maybe because I’ve been through this before,
I echo Dr Jim, I detest working under the dash.
I bought a 74 super beetle, my little brother inherited moms old 74 lincoln , both turn signal switches went out within a week of each other. beetle took an hour, town car took that day into late night.Hate Ford to this day.
Thank the LORD the smoke didn’t leak out. Recharging smoke can be expensive.
Oh, just you wait till it IS that turn signal switch! Which, one day, it’s gonna be. As maga99203 says, those things ain’t no fun at all; a cpl-three days worth of fiddle-fucking around, easy. All the steps you just went through with the other one, plus about eleventy-billion more to boot. Ask me how I know…
I inherited my fathers Dodge truck after he died in ’90. I was staying with my in-laws in WV while I looked for a home in Marietta, OH. I was driving back to my in-laws through the WV backcountry, at 11pm, adn head lights suddenly go out. I hit the brakes, and before I get stopped the lights come back on. I made it to the house safely. Next day, happens again, but it’s dusk, so I have light to play with and found that my father had done some work and he just twisted two wires together to make his fix. I took it apart, re-twisted them together and got home OK. Next day, I soldered them together and never had the problem again. I never did figure out what he fixed with that junction.
Scared me quite badly when the lights went out late at night with a near 500′ drop to my right with no guardrail.