Help with 1963 Riviera Front Parking Lights

[Riviera63]

I recently removed my front parking light/turn signal assemblies for cleaning and detailing. Before removing them completely, I tried the parking lights and noticed that the rear taillights and license plate light were illuminated while none of the front parking lights lit up. The turn signals worked fine. After cleaning and detailing the assemblies I replaced all of the bulbs and cleaned the terminals on all of the plugs. After installation I retried the parking lights with the same result. I find it odd that the rear works and none of the front parking lights work. Is there something going on that is a quirk for the Riviera or will I just need to go back to basic electrical troubleshooting? Any tips or help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[RivNut]

Try running a direct ground wire from the socket and see what happens

[Riviera63]

Hi Ed,

Thanks for the input. I'm sorry if I am being dense here. Remove the bulb or leave the bulb in, stick the wire in between the bulb and socket and then ground? Any type of wire? Thanks.

Bill

[RivNut]

Any place on the outside of the socket. 12V goes to the bulb through the wire and the silver tip on the end of the bulb. The circuit is complete when the outside of the socket goes to ground. Here's a link to an older thread that I started that links a video on how to restore old lamp sockets. Your housings / sockets could be suffering from the same maladies.

http://forums.aaca.org/f177/renewing-tun-lamp-sockets-372153.html

Ed

Edited April 22, 2015 by RivNut (see edit history)

[Riviera63]

Ed,

I found the problem. After checking everything else I traced the wire back to the firewall. This is where I learned something. I am new to this car. I always had Pontiacs. My 1963 Lemans convertible had the wires go through the firewall uninterrupted. They did not plug in. I found the plug with the parking light wire and found that it was not plugged in solidly and as a result the terminal for that wire was corroded. So I sprayed all of the terminals with radio tuner cleaner, took an emery board to them, dried the plug, plugged it in and success! Thanks for the help.

Bill