Raider L
Full Access Member
- Joined
- Sep 1, 2020
- Posts
- 1,892
- Reaction score
- 1,001
- Location
- Shreveport, LA
- First Name
- William
- Truck Year
- 1974
- Truck Model
- C10
- Engine Size
- 355
Bring your lunch and a pillow to, this is long. Sorry.
I had put a mini LED in my glove comp't because my truck didn't come with one, and I got tired of having to find my flashlight to look for something in my glove comp't at night. I found these mini LED lights years ago wandering around in Advance Auto Parts one day. Since those kind of lights have been removed from stores when the "ground affects lights" were outlawed around here by city ordinance ( they were causing wreaks due to passers-by oogling at the cool colors). So all that kind are now gone except for the tinyest useless interior lights you can still buy. So, I feel I was lucky in that I actually bought something I didn't know I would ever use, but would like some kind of low level interior light while driving at night preferably Red for enhancing night vision. A aircraft thing you know.
But the problem I was having is the wire I first chose was the White wire that feeds the door jam switches. That worked fine at night until I turned on the floor light (courtesy light) and found out that the headlight switch cuts out power to the White door jam wire with the doors closed, even since the jam switch is unmade with the door closed, and my glove comp't light wouldn't come on at night, if I turned on the floor light at the same time. But at night if I just opened the glove comp't the light would come on, which was fine. But if I'm parked and have the floor light off and might want in the glove comp't, I'd have a light.
I realized I needed a wire that would supply power to my glove comp't light any time no matter what was on, and since it's LED it didn't matter if it came on for a couple of minutes during the day, it would be a long time before I needed another light bulb. The LED interior lights I bought from Advance Auto came ready made from the mfg. with both power and gnd. wire made together in a pair of wires about four feet long with a black wire and a black wire with a white stripe soldered to the prongs of the LED and covered with shrink wrap at the base of the LED bulb. The lights I bought were all the colors they had, i.e. blue, white, red, green, and a pack of some yellow ones just in case, lol. I did find them on line on Ebay but they may be found elsewhere I guess. There were four lights per pack which was a pretty good deal for what they cost which was about 4 or 5 dollars back in 1995.
But for some reason when I got back to this little project the other day the gnd. wire had come off the LED. That was cool because I planned on re-routing it to the orange wire at the floor light which was 12v all the time. I had the grd. wire rigged up on the catch of the glove comp't that hangs on a lip, that stops the glove comp't, on the dash made for this purpose. I pop riveted a piece of alum. there on the comp't catch and attached the gnd. wire to it. It was as so that when you opened the glove comp't and the catch caught the comp't on that lip on the dash it would contact that gnd. and the light would come on. Simple.
So in making the thing up in it's new position I found the orange wire was dead! How could it be dead and the floor light still come on? After some serious study of the schematic I discovered that all the lamps and lights in the cab have no ground wire on them, it comes from inside the headlight switch. There is the orange wire and the white wire attached to each one that's it! How could the lights work without a gnd. wire. Well, a light doesn't know it doesn't need a ground. All it knows is there is power going through the filament and when that happens it glows light. And that's what is happening at the floor light. Power is traveling through the white wire to the filament and it glows when you put on the headlight switch for interior lighting. If you look up at the dome light there are two wires, one white, and one orange. Ever wonder why a chrome plated piece of plastic gets gnd. It doesn't, it's the current traveling through the filament that lights it up. One wire goes to the base, and the other goes through the body completing the circuit. So that's how the floor light was coming on when the orange wire was dead. The 12v was just going through the bulb lighting it up when I put the courtesy light switch on.
So, why didn't the orange wire have power? What's one of the first things you do when there's no power? Check fuses! Well, heck I didn't do that. Checking the fuse was the last thing I did. No matter, I did find a blown fuse that did go to the orange wire according to the schematic. Great, it ought to work now. NOPE! Still dead. What I did was I got suspicious of a good fuse and that's what lead me to replace all those fuses in that row, even the one I fished out of the glove comp't, that had been in there forever, I had just put in to replace the blown one. All fed by a 12v battery wire coming right off the fusible link on the firewall in the engine comp't.
Well, let me ask you all something, how long have those fuses been in your fuse block? I found one of those 20amp, 12v fuses had been in the fuse block for so long I had to break it to get the dang thing out of there. And I almost broke another one it was so tight! They're not supposed to be that tight. You should be able to get a glass fuse out with one of those yellow plastic tools you use to take glass fuses out with. Just put it in there and pull---pop it comes right out. Maybe one end will come out first but generally it should come right out. But I had to pry them out with a little screw driver! All three! So I scraped the contacts a bit to scrub off any corrosion and then put three new fuses in. Guess what?? The orange wire has power and my little glove comp't light works now. I just need to finish re-doing the routing and resolder the wires, one to the orange wire, and re-do the gnd. wire, all I tested and all work now.
So, if you have strange intermittent electrical problems, or no power with a good fuse in the holder, pop a new fuse in and it just might be the remedy. Especially if your fuses have been in the fuse block as long as some of mine have been. What I found was some of those fuses have been in that block since the truck rolled off the showroom floor in November 1973!!! When I rebuilt the truck in '95 I didn't replace any of the ones that didn't need replacing. I just left them in, they weren't causing any problem. Like, I guess, every ten or fifteen years change out all the fuses, or at least pull them and clean the contacts with some scotch bright, or electrical contact cleaner, and check the fuse ends they might be corroded to. See, I thought it was a wiring problem. I'd still be looking for a bad wire somewhere had I not found that blown fuse, and found how hard it was to get the others out to.
I had put a mini LED in my glove comp't because my truck didn't come with one, and I got tired of having to find my flashlight to look for something in my glove comp't at night. I found these mini LED lights years ago wandering around in Advance Auto Parts one day. Since those kind of lights have been removed from stores when the "ground affects lights" were outlawed around here by city ordinance ( they were causing wreaks due to passers-by oogling at the cool colors). So all that kind are now gone except for the tinyest useless interior lights you can still buy. So, I feel I was lucky in that I actually bought something I didn't know I would ever use, but would like some kind of low level interior light while driving at night preferably Red for enhancing night vision. A aircraft thing you know.
But the problem I was having is the wire I first chose was the White wire that feeds the door jam switches. That worked fine at night until I turned on the floor light (courtesy light) and found out that the headlight switch cuts out power to the White door jam wire with the doors closed, even since the jam switch is unmade with the door closed, and my glove comp't light wouldn't come on at night, if I turned on the floor light at the same time. But at night if I just opened the glove comp't the light would come on, which was fine. But if I'm parked and have the floor light off and might want in the glove comp't, I'd have a light.
I realized I needed a wire that would supply power to my glove comp't light any time no matter what was on, and since it's LED it didn't matter if it came on for a couple of minutes during the day, it would be a long time before I needed another light bulb. The LED interior lights I bought from Advance Auto came ready made from the mfg. with both power and gnd. wire made together in a pair of wires about four feet long with a black wire and a black wire with a white stripe soldered to the prongs of the LED and covered with shrink wrap at the base of the LED bulb. The lights I bought were all the colors they had, i.e. blue, white, red, green, and a pack of some yellow ones just in case, lol. I did find them on line on Ebay but they may be found elsewhere I guess. There were four lights per pack which was a pretty good deal for what they cost which was about 4 or 5 dollars back in 1995.
But for some reason when I got back to this little project the other day the gnd. wire had come off the LED. That was cool because I planned on re-routing it to the orange wire at the floor light which was 12v all the time. I had the grd. wire rigged up on the catch of the glove comp't that hangs on a lip, that stops the glove comp't, on the dash made for this purpose. I pop riveted a piece of alum. there on the comp't catch and attached the gnd. wire to it. It was as so that when you opened the glove comp't and the catch caught the comp't on that lip on the dash it would contact that gnd. and the light would come on. Simple.
So in making the thing up in it's new position I found the orange wire was dead! How could it be dead and the floor light still come on? After some serious study of the schematic I discovered that all the lamps and lights in the cab have no ground wire on them, it comes from inside the headlight switch. There is the orange wire and the white wire attached to each one that's it! How could the lights work without a gnd. wire. Well, a light doesn't know it doesn't need a ground. All it knows is there is power going through the filament and when that happens it glows light. And that's what is happening at the floor light. Power is traveling through the white wire to the filament and it glows when you put on the headlight switch for interior lighting. If you look up at the dome light there are two wires, one white, and one orange. Ever wonder why a chrome plated piece of plastic gets gnd. It doesn't, it's the current traveling through the filament that lights it up. One wire goes to the base, and the other goes through the body completing the circuit. So that's how the floor light was coming on when the orange wire was dead. The 12v was just going through the bulb lighting it up when I put the courtesy light switch on.
So, why didn't the orange wire have power? What's one of the first things you do when there's no power? Check fuses! Well, heck I didn't do that. Checking the fuse was the last thing I did. No matter, I did find a blown fuse that did go to the orange wire according to the schematic. Great, it ought to work now. NOPE! Still dead. What I did was I got suspicious of a good fuse and that's what lead me to replace all those fuses in that row, even the one I fished out of the glove comp't, that had been in there forever, I had just put in to replace the blown one. All fed by a 12v battery wire coming right off the fusible link on the firewall in the engine comp't.
Well, let me ask you all something, how long have those fuses been in your fuse block? I found one of those 20amp, 12v fuses had been in the fuse block for so long I had to break it to get the dang thing out of there. And I almost broke another one it was so tight! They're not supposed to be that tight. You should be able to get a glass fuse out with one of those yellow plastic tools you use to take glass fuses out with. Just put it in there and pull---pop it comes right out. Maybe one end will come out first but generally it should come right out. But I had to pry them out with a little screw driver! All three! So I scraped the contacts a bit to scrub off any corrosion and then put three new fuses in. Guess what?? The orange wire has power and my little glove comp't light works now. I just need to finish re-doing the routing and resolder the wires, one to the orange wire, and re-do the gnd. wire, all I tested and all work now.
So, if you have strange intermittent electrical problems, or no power with a good fuse in the holder, pop a new fuse in and it just might be the remedy. Especially if your fuses have been in the fuse block as long as some of mine have been. What I found was some of those fuses have been in that block since the truck rolled off the showroom floor in November 1973!!! When I rebuilt the truck in '95 I didn't replace any of the ones that didn't need replacing. I just left them in, they weren't causing any problem. Like, I guess, every ten or fifteen years change out all the fuses, or at least pull them and clean the contacts with some scotch bright, or electrical contact cleaner, and check the fuse ends they might be corroded to. See, I thought it was a wiring problem. I'd still be looking for a bad wire somewhere had I not found that blown fuse, and found how hard it was to get the others out to.
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