'94 buick brake light question (I know, not a G-body)

[83hurst-olds]

OK, this is not a G-body, but it is my now beat-to-heck daily driver, which is a '94 Buick Lesabre, so I can keep my G-body ('83 Hurst Olds) nice. It was recently hit hard from behind which then pushed me into the back of my wife's car.

My question is that I am going to buy this car back from the insurance company for a whopping $345 bucks. It still drives OK except that my tail light lenses were knocked out and the bulbs broken. I know it is by design that the turn signal won't blink without the bulbs so that you know you have a problem. I was going to buy a cheap boat trailer light with brake and turn signal capabilities and bolt it to the car where the standard lenses are. My question, is will the turn signals work right with a standard 3 wire pigtail or is there something specific to these brake wiring? It looks like just 3 wires...

Thanks.

This is the car I am talking about:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?aid=88289&id=1408540075

So that I can keep this car nice: 🙂
http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?aid=91502&id=1408540075

 

[joeairforce]

Kinda getto.... but I don't see why it shouldn't work as long as you're still completing the entire circuit......

If it was me though I'd just go get some "new" lights for it from the junkyard.......

 

[pontiacgp]

I 2nd the vote for junkyard lites....after all your buying the car back for $345 but that`s just deducted out of the settlement they gave ya...spend a little.. 8)

 

[83hurst-olds]

Well, the originals wouldn't go back into the spot without major work. In fact, it took me about an hour of hammering just to get my trunk where it will open and close but it is still bent up. It wouldn't close at all when I had just the shell of the light still there (basically with no lenses). If you look at the first pic on the top facebook link, you'll see what I mean.

A trailer light would be ghetto for sure, but if it'd keep me legal and would work, that'd be ok. I bought my Hurst Olds to be a daily driver but when I picked it up with just over 24k miles, it was just too nice to put 60+ miles a day on it. So, my intention (and all my wife approved me for :lol: ) then became to not put hardly any money in it and just drive the '94 into the ground. Hopefully it'll last long enough to get the H/O paid off then maybe I can get another daily driver.

Thanks guys.

 

[83hurst-olds]

I FINALLY got around to doing this. The only light I could find was a 2 wire light that grounded to the chassis. It works as a tail light, and it works as brake light. However, my turn signal still won't blink though it brightens so I guess I can now click the lever manually and make it work. I swapped out the bulb from the other side to see if it was a bulb issue. It fit and lit up just like the one that came with the boat light but still no blinker.

So, any way to "force" the blinker to work? I know it can sense whether there is a bulb out and stuff, any idea if a person can wire a resistor somewhere and trick it into thinking it's the correct bulb.

I'll have to take a picture of my ghetto mod. It sure is ghetto, but we are trying to find a place with a nice shop and some acreage so another car will have to wait. I was going to buy another G-body (maybe another H/O) but I decided to put my $5,500 that I had raised from selling a few things to put down on a house. I want that more than my daily to be nice...

 

[Bonnewagon]

Buy the house, then you can worry about cars. Anyway, you can use 2 lights on each side. The original was a 3 wire unit with 1 wire for running light, 1 wire for brake light/directional, and 1 wire ground. So wire them both for ground, then each gets a wire for either running or brake lights, and mount them as they would be normally,side by side. I don't know why you didn't just get 3 wire trailer lights, they are the standard, and Harbor Freight sells them super cheap. A friend did as you after he got rearended and even though I gave him a set of correct Firebird tail lights, he kept the trailer jobs since they worked so well. He later gave me the car for parts so it was all good.

 

[83hurst-olds]

Well, I guess these would be considered 3 wire since the bulb is dual brightness just like the original bulb, it just grounds to the chassis instead of by the wire. I also tried grounding the ground to the grounding bolt (mounting bolt) and it made no difference for the blinker. So, essentially I used the green wire for brake/turn signal, and the brown wire for tail lights. It seemed all the bolt out (not flush mount) were this way. Some had license plate lights which I didn't need.

If the ground should be grounded to the wire and not to the chassis, I can probably drill it out bigger and put a plastic insulator between it and the chassis and then ground it ONLY to the ground wire. I didn't test this before I mounted it into the car.

Thanks.

 

[Bonnewagon]

OK, you're good, 3 wire it is. Yeah, those trailer lights used the trailer frame for ground. I don't trust that, and run a dedicated ground. That should do the trick. If not, check for a pinched wire from the collision.

 

[83hurst-olds]

Thanks for your help.

I've worked on it some more this weekend and it is almost working normally. My hazard flashers work as they should on the outside, and indicated properly inside. However, my right turn signal is still lighting on the outside, but not flashing (if I move the indicator manually it looks like it should). It could be the relay, but it seems odd that it would go out at the same time as my wreck, but it never blew a fuse or anything (if something shorted out).

Does anyone know of a way to wire around the indicator? I have heard people have to do something special when making LED boards to make their blinkers work. Maybe put a resistor or something inline with the bulbs?