John Lee's No Pop Out No Fail Front Turn Signals

[Sharps40]

Well, a bit tired of tweekin the front running lights and turn signals. They were intermittent due to bad grounds. A fault on these, the ground is thru the attachment of the socket to the lamp to the hood to the body.....less than usefull at nearly 50 years old. So, new sockets from a 71 up GM that have separate ground wires and I'll fix the harness up with a new one.

Driver side socket is three wires...ground is thru the socket, the third wire is a paired feed for the PS parking light. I'll replace it with a 3 wire socket that has ground wire and still pair up the parking light to feed the Passenger side parking light like original. The pairing is because the bulkhead connector has only three wires...L TS, R TS and a single feed for parking lights that pairs off from the DS lamp socket to feed the PS lamp socket.



PS lamp socket is two wires, grounded thru the socket itself.



The three wire bulkhead connector is in good shape and I'll reuse it, can't find a new one aftermarket anyway. Its the upper of the two going thru the firewall at this point. LT, RT and Park light wires only.



The original lamp sockets have seen better days. Neither stay in place and neither provide adaquate ground. The original style pop out to change bulbs...that becomes important later as I switch to the 71 and up GMC sockets and mod them to work.



New sockets are three wire with wired ground...not an exact fit but they can be made to work. I just have to remove the lamp bucket and lens to change the bulbs. A bit more work but its a better socket and minimal changes to the original lamp buckets...minor tweeks only to the cheep and replaceable lamp sockets and one small hole in the lamp bucket.



Here's one installed. Instead of snapping in and out like the originals, I simply mount them in the factory hole and slightly bend the tabs to hold them snugly in place. Again, a minor change to the original lamp bucket will be required and result in a better quality separatly ground socket making a more reliable circut.



Just so you know...the running/park light filiment is always the taller one, its dimmer. The shorter filiment is always the flasher, its brighter. I marked all the running light wires for creation and hook up of a totally new wireing harness from brand new wireing with all soldered connections.



I partly remove the DS hood brace to access and remove the original wireing harness. This prevents any cutting of the old harness for now since I want to copy and build it anew one wire at a time.

[Sharps40]

The old harness is removed, unwrapped, untangled and laid out on the floor to measure and one by one replace the original wires and sockets with new ones.



Starting with the parking light circut, I hook up the drivers side lamp, its run back to the proper connector on the bulkhead plug and its paired wire that feeds the parking light filiment on the passenger side. All soldered and insulated. As you see, the original wireing harness is only removed one joint at a time as I insert new wires to replace old, new sockets to replace old, etc....keeps me from reversin wires and messin it up. Do it right Richie cause yer gonna tape it all before its installed and tested. Brave or foolish, you decide!



All taped up and ready to install....



A test install, the ground wires are looped from the new socket over to the lamp bucket hold down screw. Each lamp with a solid ground now. And at the intial hookup, I have running and turn signal lamps functional on the passenger side.



Woo Hoo, the drivers side running and turn signal lamps work too.



OkeyDokey Piggie Pokie....time for bed. I'll route all the wires and reassemble everything tomorrow and pretty much forget about worryin if my front lamps and signals are working. No more trips to the front of the truck before each drive to wiggle the sockets into a good ground ... Just start the truck and drive. Gettin more like a reliable vehicle every day.

[Sharps40]

Finishing up the front lamps this morning. Routing the new wiring harness and ever so slight a modification to the lamp buckets to ensure no vibration related failures of the new lamp sockets....i.e. no popping out like the original snap in jobbies.

The new 71 and up sockets come with a handy hole down one side....I reamed it out with a 1/8" drill bit by hand, lined it up on the lamp bucket and bored thru with the 1/8" drill bit. A stainless steel tapping screw (deck screw) thru the convenient hole and the new lamp socket is pulled down firmly against its rubber seal and affixed to the lamp bucket....basically hood-slam proof. Should be less consternation now with the sockets staying in place every time I close the hood.



A view of the inside of the bucket, socket firmly held in place by the new screw mounting. Its pretty solid. I think I'll be pleased. And the bulbs are easy to remove once the lens is off the bucket. Plenty of room for fat fingers in there.



The PS side lamp installed, grounded to one of the mounting screws and initial routing of the main wiring harness over to the DS hood support I loosened up earlier when removing the old harness.



The DS lamp bucket mounted, also separately grounded to the bucket mounting screw. Routing the main harness thru spankey new rubber lined clamps and then down into the DS hood brace to hide the long run/keep it from dangling into the engine compartment.



And back at the firewall, the main harness comes out from under the DS hood brace, thru another pair of rubber lined clamps and into the bulkhead connector. A thorough check of function and I have no worries. Slammed the hood a couple three times, no pinched wires and no failure of the bulbs to function. As soon as it stops raining, time for a ride....all new lights up front, worry free night time driving.....Wonder if I should link the park leads together to give me front running lights? (These are park lights, means they are on in the park position and off with the headlights on. (This was the norm till 66 or 67ish when the Fed mandated all front and rear lights light up with the switch in the park and run positions instead of the rear only.)