[willyp]

I was thinking how it could be a grounding problem. I had a similar problem with the reverse light housing I got from the junk yard and after pulling my hair out my dad and I finally figured it out. The bulb socket even though pressed into the housing did not make a good connection to the housing. I ended up using a Dremel tool and grounding the socket and the housing down to bare metal and dropping a big glob of solder to join the socket and housing together. It worked like a champ…..reverse lights!

Back to the Brake lights, all fingers pointed to a bad ground for the tail light but continuity checks from both rear tail light housings to the engine block were always good and i always had the proper voltages. I though back to my reverse light problem. Even thought I cleaned the inside of the bulb sockets well and used dielectric grease plus I added an extra ground wire from the housing to the fender the housings still had a fair share of dirt and corrosion. I removed and marked the 2 housings left and right, then off to do some sand blasting. After I sand blasted the tail light housings I conducted another continuity test on the work bench between the socket and housing……..only this time the right rear housing showed a bad ground between the socket and housing. I dropped a bead of solder around the copper colored socket and the base where they are pressed together on both rear housings….continuity check good!

I put everything back together and it works great. I never thought the sockets themselves could go bad……..also the bad socket was the passenger side, right rear and the driver side left rear was the side that was giving me a fit. Weird grounding gremlins, maybe after 44 years corrosion gets in between the 2 dissimilar metals between the socket and housing.

I have my fingers crossed this time. If not a have ground wire that I am going to run separate grounds all the way up the frame to the engine block.

I’ll keep you guys up to date if this resolves my problem. Wish me luck!