Help with a pig's tail...

[saxart]

So after getting my truck home a month ago, I found out that the lights didn't work. None of them. Well, one front parking lamp worked, that's it. (Yeah, you're right, I should have checked them before buying the truck, but... I was in LOVE! LOL) I figured it was the rear wire harness, as I saw that it was pretty butchered when I crawled under the truck in the previous owner's driveway the day I purchased it.

Anyway, last week I figured I'd pull some lights and see what was happening.

I first pulled out the left hand back up light. It fell out in my hand, with just a little stub of a wire sticking out the back. I could see the tips of a few long pine needles inside the cavity the light came out of.

Moving down to the taillight on that side, as I pulled it out, there were NO wires attached to the light bucket on that side, and the cavity behind it was PACKED full of chopped up pine needles and mouse nest material. Damn mice! Long story short, the other side was nearly the same way, except the one taillight had a chewed up plug with some broken wires attached to it.



So... What to do? All of the light buckets are basically bare and are in need of the entire socket.

Here is what the back up light buckets look like:



And the taillight buckets look like this:





I logged onto LMC and see that they sell the pig-tails for each light. Using this method, I'd have about $20 plus shipping in the sockets and would have to use some trailer wiring loom (another $10's worth) to make up the harness between the rear plug and the light pig tails.



Another option is to buy the entire rear loom from classic-parts.com.



http://www.classicparts.com/1968-72-.../#.V2C1NY-cE2w

I'm looking for opinions on either of these two vendors and the parts mentioned above. I'm not opposed to "making" the rear loom using the LMC parts if they are better quality, but my gut says it would just be better to "man up" and buy the rear loom from classic parts. (as long as it is good quality)

Thoughts?

[cdowns]

prts stores have socket rebuilding kits cheap with no need to pay and wait for shipping you just walk in buy and walk out with the bag of stuff to rebuild your lights

[Rich69shortfleet]

Just buy the entire rear light harness. It has a plug in the crossmember just ahead of the rear bumper. The harness contains all the sockets, they just snap onto the rear of the metal light housings. Any joint you create splicing in new wire or pigtails will be susceptible to breaking and weather damage. An entirely new harness, and not that expensive in the end, is the way to go.

[snipescastle2]

I found that the '73 to '81 box style Chevy trucks use a similar harness, at least the main plug that connects to the front harness has the same four pin plug. You would have to change the pigtails on each tail light and back up light, but cheaper than a repro harness. Got one at the local pick n pull for $20. I already had the pigtails... Just an idea.
Ben