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Here's a truly odd one. I think I solved the heater issue I was having though. I checked the coolant level and found that it was low. I added more coolant and all seems fine now. It is time for a coolant flush though. All three of my vehicles need it as well as 2 of them need an oil change... Looks like a good half a days work.
Anyway, I am experiences a quirky turn signal. It is on the driver's side. It only happens when the lights are on and then only intermittently. When it happens it acts like a bulb is burnt out with the fast and short blinking. Only there are not any bulbs out. When it has happened, I have gotten out of my truck to see what is happening. The front seems fine. However, the rear lights are where the quirk is. When the turn signal is on the bright lights up, but near as bright as it should. When it goes of, the reverse light, driver's side license plate light and tail-light illuminate. Then alternates back to a not as bright turn signal.
It's hard to explain... maybe I'll try taking a video of it when it happens again and posting it. But at this point I am at a loss as to where to even begin....
This one was done with my cell phone on the road. I had to be quick as it only let me do 15 second spurts. I did more when I got home with a better camera. I thought I uploaded them, but I don't see them yet. I did a few depicting several different ways in which the turn signal operation is funky. When I further investigated the problem, it appears that the problem is not isolated to just the signal, but the whole lighting system in the rear.... Brake lights, reverse lights etc.
http://www.carspace.com/videos/play!id=.5c97cf63
Anyway, right after I got the truck I installed a Class III tow hitch and along with that hitch came the requisite wiring. The wiring kit was really simple to install. Just a couple of wiring harnesses at the back of the truck that needed to be unplugged and a trailer kit harness plugged in between. That was several years ago. One day I went to plug in the lights for a trailer I was towing and I heard a POP! and I think the driver's side, but I am not sure lights quit working. I had blown a fuse. Simple enough to fix, but when I unplugged the trailer, POP! again. It turns out the wiring had frayed causing it to short everytime it touched the frame. So wrapped it all up in electrical tape and all has been fine until just recently.
When I started having my turn signal issue, my first thought was to check that trailer kit. So I unplugged the extension that I had used to get the wires from under the fender to the hitch. As soon as I did that the lights worked normally for a while and then they went back to being quirky. Sometimes they would work, other times I had issues. Then just in the past couple of days it went to all the time and so that is where I was at last night.
Today, I crawled under the back of the truck and noticed that when I had unplugged the trailer kit, I only unplugged the extension. I noticed that the actual trailer kit was "spliced" in between a factory wiring harness. I say "spliced" but it really was just a couple plugs unplugged and the wiring kit plugged in between. So decided it couldn't hurt to take the trailer light kit out. I unplugged it, plugged the factory wiring harness back together and Wha-LA! The lights worked. All seemed normal. Until tonight when I went to use the signal and I was back to where I was at last night. Grrr... So something else is the problem.
When I got to my destination I got out (this was really bugging me) and grabbed my flashlight and crawled back under the truck. I checked my connections as the harness to make sure it was still tight and as I did so and moved the harness around, I could hear the lights (the clickity turn signal sound) get erratic. Sometimes it was the fast clicking and other times it was normal. I traced the wires up to a wire loom above the frame. I could see a couple ground wires coming out and I jiggled these. Sure enough, I could move the wire one way and I would have normal operation. Move it another way and bad connections. So it does appear to be a ground wire and I think I must have found it, although I couldn't do anything about it right then. I did move it around so that the lights are working as of now until the wire gets bumped or jiggled the wrong way. Tomorrow I guess I get to crawl under and see what needs to happen to get it fixed. But at least I am closer to solving the problem!!
Now that has stopped and I do not have a clue why. If it helps the inside dome lights wil not work either unless the over ride button is punched. . but then they do not shut off. Is this all related?
The door thingy. . I got to the switch but was unable to get it out. . so I am not sure that is the problem or not.
I am just scared it is going to stop on me and I will not be able to get anything running. . . scary to have a vehicle like that. . but right now. . no other choice. . ..
Volt meter will slowly dip from fourteen down to around 11, taking up to 5 minutes to drop, sometimes bounce back up momentarily only to drop again, and the truck will sputter and die. Sometimes I can put it in gear while it's rolling and it'll kick back in and pop back up to 14 volts and be fine...but usually if it DOES start back up, it'll just slowly dip back under 11 and die, and to keep from fighting with it I'll just coast till I find a decent place to pull over. The radio, a/c, lights, everything accessory continue to work, lights are NOT dim at all, even though the volt meter reads nothing with the key on. Then I sit, turn the ignition off and back on...sometimes getting absolutely nothing, sometimes barely over 11, but when it's ready to go and run right it'll jump all the way back to 14...and start like nothing happened. If I don't let it sit for about five minutes, I'll try to start it and it'll do something that's almost like it's fouling out...won't be weak turning over, but it's like as soon as the engine kicks in something is killing it...so I let it sit a little longer, and eventually it'll start and sometimes won't do it again. Also, I've noticed that sometimes the security light will come on...more about that in a moment.
It has done this since around 105k, it'll happen for a couple of months, then go away, sometimes for six months at a time until it returns. It seems to happen more when it's hot outside, whether the air is running or not, and when it's raining at night, obviously when there's more of a pull on the battery. Very early on I noticed that using my blinkers would make it take huge dips, and sometimes make it begin the "slow fade" when it had been fine...so I just stopped using them altogether...and it still happens. It happens at freeway speeds, city driving, has happened while I've been stopped at red lights, it doesn't really matter...and it'll seem to be getting worse and worse, I'll repair or replace something, and then it'll go away for a few months...and come back.
I have replaced the battery, put in two alternators, a starter, battery cables, found a security system under the steering column that would click and keep it off (may have been unrelated) and took it and all its wiring out, found a heat shield on the starter between it and the exhaust pipe that was shorting out from the hot wire to the pipe, tried to make it work and eventually removed it...found various bad connections in the dash and replace them...and all of these things would make it better for a few months, and then it'd come back.
As far as I know I'm the third owner of the truck...the guy I bought it from told me nothing about the security system (it made the lights flash), and it has wiring that suggests that someone had an amplified sound system in it as well...all of which I've removed, and I thought maybe bad wiring by them in the past was where this was coming from, until I checked message boards and saw others having the same problems. The only things I can think to replace now are the ignition and ignition switch, and I'm starting to think maybe there's a bad circuit in the CPU or something.
If anyone has fixed this or has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them. I'm ready to blow the truck up before it stalls on the freeway again and succeeds in killing me.
Thanks,
Eddie :shades:
Thanks!