Stumped: front parking lamp won't work on 64 Riv

[bodayguy]

So my drivers side front parking lamp, the smaller bulb below the turn signal bulb, won't light. The passenger side one works fine.

This is the single-post bulb at the bottom, inside the "clam shells" (if it was a 65).

 

The turn-signal bulb is two post, pos and neg. This bulb appears to be pos only.

I noticed if I disconnected that one bulb altogether, the turn signal wouldn't go on.

 

I thought there was a bad ground so I wired a second one, but that just blew the fuse. There must be a ground in that single-post bulb??? I don't understand how that fixture works.

 

After trying everything, I reconnected the original wiring and got the turn signal to work again, but that darn bottom bulb still won't go on. I checked it for power, it has power in the wire, and the bulb is OK, and I cleaned out the socket with some sand paper and got all the rust out, pulled the connector pin out some, etc.

 

Still no luck.

 

Anyone have experience with that?

[telriv]

There is a spring on that inner wire to make contact with the bulb with the little piece of solder on the tip end. If there was rust in the socket the spring could have rotted away so that there is no contact with the solder. remove the bulb & turn on the lights & see if you have power to that little post on the end of the wire with a test light. The bulbs ground through the socket around the outer diameter of the brass on the bulb to the light housing & which turn is grounded to the car through the light assembly attached to the fender. Reason the fuse blew when you grounded one terminal of the signal light is because you made a direct short.

 

 

Tom T.

[bodayguy]

There was power on the pin, yeah, I checked it with a meter. I decided to order a new socket from Summit. I'll see if it works with the wire, and then I could junk what's there. I do think the spring area is rotted, yeah, good call.

[Hazdaz]

When you are checking it, make sure the housing is at least partially bolted in.  The entire housing is ground and the bolts connect it to the rest of the chassis.  In fact, clean out the screw bolts with a wire brush while you're at it.

[RivNut]

8 hours ago, bodayguy said:

There was power on the pin, yeah, I checked it with a meter. I decided to order a new socket from Summit. I'll see if it works with the wire, and then I could junk what's there. I do think the spring area is rotted, yeah, good call.

Somewhere a long time ago, I posted a link that showed how to put new a wire and spring into the existing socket.  That socket is soldered to the housing and will be hard to replace.  Most of the problems are with old rubber at the back of the housing that doesn't allow the spring to move the wire.  When you push the bulb in to seat it, the wire is too stiff for the spring to return it so it makes contact with the base of the bulb.

[Turbinator]

Without fear of adding overkill on grounding I’d like to offer a grounding technique 60Flatop gave me that worked. Ground the bulb socket to a solid piece on the frame. Solder the ground wire on the metal bulb socket by fanning the copper wire strands against the bulb socket makes it easier to solder. “ For What It’s Worth”. The basics elude me.