turn signal wiring issue

[ryan.ororke]

So this problem has been occurring for quite some time, neither my dad or I know what the problem could be, other than a wiring issue of some sort.

So here is what has been happening. Whenever I press the brakes my left turn signal dimly lights up (as seen on my dash and the actual light,) and would slow way down. Off the brakes and no problem its back to normal. It went away for a while so I decided to ignore it. Now the problem is back.

Now the problem is in the right turn signal, which recent went out on the front side of the car. It is having the same problem the left side had, but to a bigger extent. The turn signal nearly fully lights up when I press the brakes, and refuses to actually work (say at a stop light while turning right, it won't blink, just sits there almost completely lit.) This annoyed me and once I got home, I put it into park (as any normal person would do of course,) and once I passed reverse, it flashed completely lit. So i put it back into reverse, and sure enough while in reverse the turn signal is fully lit up.

All in all, I have no clue what the problem is, neither my dad or I seem to know what to do. I assume that it will be some big wiring issue that will render my daily driver car useless for a day or two tearing through wires. Hopefully not though.

ANY help/advice would be much appreciated.

[jeffnhiscars]

It's almost certainly a short so 1st check for parasitic draws.

There are not many places that have wires common to BOTH turn signals and the brakes so that narrows it down somewhat. I'd take a very close look at the wiring diagrams, then put your signals on & start wiggling wires.

[cardnation]

I had a similar issue only mine was in combination with the running lights. When my headlights/marker-lights were on, my right signal was active.

Turned out to be an issue (bent tab) inside my signal housing.

Go ahead and clean up the connections while you are in there, probably a fair amount of gunk if its anything like mine.

[spdracrm3]

sound like you are having ground problems at the taillight housings (the voltage is trying to find a path to ground thru the other bulb filaments (ie the other bulbs lighting up dimly) and yes this will backfeed voltage to the cluster lamps .you need to either clean the grounds (and other connections in the housings) or trace the actual ground supply to the housing and clean that where it attaches to body.

got to http://www.wedophones.com/BMWManualsLead.htm
and find/download your appropriate manual and diagrams to find ground point

[Rose E30]

I have had a litany of problems with my signals. When I first bought the car, the left turn signal would not work. I solved this by replacing the turn signal switch with one from a junked 89 vert. (Cleaning the contacts might also have helped, but the lever was in better shape). I then a problem where the left signal will not function if headlight switch is pulled. I think I might have inadvertently corrected this last night. I had the running lights off, and turned on the flasher. I then jiggled the wheel back and forth, which caused flash rate to jump a bit. For some reason, this seemed to fix the left signal when I used it with the headlights on. If you have the signal lighting up dimly, I think it means there is contact somewhere in the system. As others have said, take the device apart and clean it with contact cleaner. If all else fails, buy a new one from someone on the forums. Hope this helps.