high beams flashing when right turn signal on

[mitchlikesbikes]

hey guys, i'm hoping that somebody on here can help me out with this. ever since i've had my e30 the high beams have flashed at the same time as the right turn signal when it is on. the left signal works normally. i have now tried 3 different combination switches so i think i have successfully ruled that out. i have looked up wiring diagrams and tried to figure it out but this combination switch circuit is a lot more complicated than what i'm used to troubleshooting. any help would be great. maybe melted wires somewhere? i'm not sure.

[Das Delfin]

Just off the top of my head.. do your turn signal lights come on when your high beams are on?

What I mean by that is your front turn lights are both parking lights and turn signals, with the turn signal being a brighter light. When you turn on your high beams, does the brighter light come on and stay constant?

Also try removing the right hand side front turn signal bulb. Take a look at its wiring harness. It should have three wires coming out. See if you see anything weird about it.

[nrubenstein]

I'd start at the relays in the fusebox.

[Das Delfin]

^ I don't think a relay is the problem. None of the high or low beam relays share circuits with the turn signals. I think someone rewired his lights at some point and mixed up the wires and now the high beam is grounding out through the turn signal

[ELVA164]

Pretty good prank. I did that to a friend once in high school, except I wired his horn to his right turn signal.

[mitchlikesbikes]

Just off the top of my head.. do your turn signal lights come on when your high beams are on?

What I mean by that is your front turn lights are both parking lights and turn signals, with the turn signal being a brighter light. When you turn on your high beams, does the brighter light come on and stay constant?

Also try removing the right hand side front turn signal bulb. Take a look at its wiring harness. It should have three wires coming out. See if you see anything weird about it.

So my right turn signal does Come on solid when my high beams are on. I didn't notice this before. I'm thinking now that you're right and my wiring is messed up up front somewhere. I'm going to pull the harness out and see what I can find

[mitchlikesbikes]

I've stripped the harness all the way back to the fuse box and everything looks normal. No weird splices or any signs of any wiring being worn or tampered with. I'm stumped

[mitchlikesbikes]

Well mystery solved... Sort of. The short is somewhere in my cluster. I think the turn indicator circuit is shorting to the high beam indicator switch. Cause when I unplug the cluster everything works normally. Wtf.

[MrBurgundy]

Pretty good prank. I did that to a friend once in high school, except I wired his horn to his right turn signal.

lol

[Das Delfin]

Well mystery solved... Sort of. The short is somewhere in my cluster. I think the turn indicator circuit is shorting to the high beam indicator switch. Cause when I unplug the cluster everything works normally. Wtf.

I was hoping it wasn't that. The cluster has a printed circuit board which is awkward to troubleshoot. Try taking it apart and maybe you can trace the circuits around the turn signal/high beam indicators to find the problem

[mitchlikesbikes]

I was hoping it wasn't that. The cluster has a printed circuit board which is awkward to troubleshoot. Try taking it apart and maybe you can trace the circuits around the turn signal/high beam indicators to find the problem

So, after stripping the harness and tracing it back to the fuse box and not finding shit I pull my cluster apart to find that when my dumbass reflowed the solder on some of the joints I created a tiny little solder bridge between the contacts for the two indicator bulbs. Used my trusty pick set to remove that little morsel of solder and boom, problem solved. Thanks for the help guys but I played myself on this one

[nrubenstein]

^ I don't think a relay is the problem. None of the high or low beam relays share circuits with the turn signals. I think someone rewired his lights at some point and mixed up the wires and now the high beam is grounding out through the turn signal

The relays are a good location to test for spurious signals. All the OP's effort tracing the wiring harness after the fusebox would have been unnecessary if a five second test at the relays showed trigger voltage.

[mitchlikesbikes]

The relays are a good location to test for spurious signals. All the OP's effort tracing the wiring harness after the fusebox would have been unnecessary if a five second test at the relays showed trigger voltage.

That's true. Peeling the harness back allowed me to get rid of my AC and fog light wiring that I don't need anymore so it wasn't a complete waste of time

[Das Delfin]

The relays are a good location to test for spurious signals. All the OP's effort tracing the wiring harness after the fusebox would have been unnecessary if a five second test at the relays showed trigger voltage.

Right

Except when you look at the wiring diagrams and see that the turn signal wiring has absolutely nothing in common with the headlight wiring, you start to wonder what are you checking relays for exactly???