Technical Tail light out!!

Ok my 60 Olds tail light is out. Start this off I'm not a wire guy! The tail light runs all 3 tail light, brake light(which works) and the turn signal(which works). All 3 run off the same bulb so why don't the tail light stay on!!??


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Bulb burned out? Brake & turn are on the same filament, lights are on the other filament, hence bulb burned out, replace bulb?

 

Dual filiment bulb. I filiment bad?

 

Swap the bulbs side for side and see what happens. Or take a look at the bulb in question, one of the filaments may be off or hanging loose.

 

If you can verify that you have power going to the low-filament (running light) wire, sometimes I have found that a contact inside the bulb socket has gotten hot and has slightly receded.
look down in the socket.
you will see a plastic disk with two contact ****ons.
check carefully to see if one of the ****ons might have sunk down into the plastic disk a tiny bit. (usually from an overheating connection due to dirt or tarnish).
If one of those contact ****ons recedes even a small amount, it will not complete the contact with the bulb.
sometimes there will be a tiny spring under the ****on that can collapse also.
with the power off, clean the contacts.
I like using a very tiny dab of grease to prevent corrosion from coming back. dont worry, grease will not "short out" the socket, and will make a cleaned connection last a whole lot longer before requiring another cleaning.

why be ordinary?

 

I have a test light I use to find whether there's power to the item I'm trying to make work.

 

In the factory grease was put on all bulbs when installed.

 

I changed the bulbs and checked the fuse. Everything was good with the fuse. Last night it was just my tail lights now today nothing works on my p***enger side at all!!?? Could it be the Headlight switch???? Thanks for the help!


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I got it!! Inside of the bulb socket the ground spring wasn't coming all the way up and touching my bulb!! Go figure!! Time to get ready for the car show tonight!! Thanks for all the comments!


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Cool, you got it figured out and working.

 

Napa has rebuild kits for those sockets which include the new wire pigtail, the small round insulator and spring fwiw

 

I always found those springy things to be fiddly. I changed the rear sockets on my Ford to a newer GM type.