1963 Buick Riviera.. Anyone know? What are the three Light bulbs in the front turn signal

[Guest JDriv63]

So I have three Light bulbs in the front turn signal.. One at the top, one at the bottom, and one off to the side.. The one at the top is orange and blinks. The one off to the side is orange and stays on solid while the turn signal is engaged. The one at the bottom does nothing and remains off... So my questions are what should all three bulbs be doing? And what is the bottom bulb for? And what color bulb should be where?

[Bleach]

I think the bottom one is the parking lamp. When you pull the light switch to the first click it should turn on. I don't remember what color the bulb should actually be.

[RivNut]

I've got a couple of loose housings on the shelf.  My loose ones show that the upper and lower are the parking lamps, and the center one is the turn signal.  This goes along with the wiring diagram that shows two bulbs/wires coming off the harness for parking lamps and one bulb/wire coming off the harness for the turn signal.  The two parking bulbs are a single filament bulb #97NA which has a candle power of 4. The turn signal bulb can be either an 1157NA or a 2057NA.  The 1157NA and the 2057NA  each have a candle power of 24.  The oddity is that both the 1157NA and the 20157NA are dual filament bulbs but only tthe brighter of the two filaments is used for the turn signal. (The NA suffix at the end of the number stands for "Natural Amber.") Perhaps someone else can chime in on any known differences between the 1157NA and the 2057NA.   This information is the same for 1963 Rivieras that have the three bulb housing. On the 1963's that have the two bulb housing, the 1157NA/2057NA bulbs use both filaments.  The dimmer filament and parking lamp bulb for parking lamps, and the brighter filament in the 1157NA/2057NA for the turn signal.

 

Ed 

[Bleach]

According to a GE catalog there is a slight difference in initial lumens and nominal initial lumens.

http://genet.gelighting.com/LightProducts/Dispatcher?CHANNEL=Commercial&REQUEST=COMMERCIALCOMPARE&ANSI_NOSUBSTRING=No&PAGENO=2&FILTER=FT0010%3AAutomotive^FT0003%3A57&BREADCRUMB=Lamps_Miniature^Automotive&SHOWALL=11|13&REQUESTFROMRESULTPAGE=TRUE&MODELSELECTIONFILTER=FT0010%3AAutomotive&COMPAREPRODCODES=26975^44763&FILTERFIELD=&SEARCHFIELD=null&FROMRESULTPAGE=FROMRESULTSJSP&SORTKEY=&SEARCHVALUE=null&CATEGORY=Lamps_Miniature&sortkey=&CompareCheck=26975&CompareCheck=44763

[Jim Cannon]

Without a picture, I can't say for sure that he's not also got cornering lights in there.

 

He says one light is on constant when the turn signal is on.  Sounds like a cornering light to me...

[RivNut]

As I re-read the initial post and read Jim's answer, I'll go out on a limb and say that he has the early '63 housing with cornering lights.  The cornering light should be white though. It's to illuminate the curb during a turn.  The other two should be amber though.  An 1157NA or 2057NA for the combo turn signal/ park light and a 97NA for single filament park light.  It's easy to see which one is which, the combo turn signal / park light will have two contacts inside the base.

 

Here's a picture of both style housings.  Neither of these have the cornering lamps but you can see the opening in which they would go.   The picture of the backs show two dark wires for the park light and a green wire for the turn signal.  You'll notice a dark wire and the green wire going into the same socket on the one housing.  This housing has the combo turn signal / park light.

 

 

 

Edited June 19, 2015 by RivNut (see edit history)