Brake light issue
 

Hey all, I'm brand new to the forum and about 3 weeks in to my relationship with my patina'd 1966 1500.


Current problem: no brake lights.

This was present when I bought it, at the time I also had no right rear turn signal, no tail lights, no function from the hazard flasher. I have rewire do the rear end, check and cleaned the existing ground at he rear end and added another ground. I opened and cleaned the hazard switch, opened and cleaned the turn signal switch in the colum (it's kinda worn but working). Cleaned the brake light fuse terminals in the panel (broke an otherwise fine fuse in the proscess), that seemed to be the tail light issue at least.

Now I have all function except brake lights!!!!!
Again the brake light switch seems to be testing fine, but I don't get a signal when jump from the brake switch to the brown wire in the fire wall.

Ideas?

Re: Brake light issue
 

It has been a while since I went through this on my 64 1500. Do you have power in the brake light wire at the rear? If there is power in the cab but not at the rear, a plug on the inside of the firewall might cause a connection problem. I remember being worried that the insulation on the brown wire had come off at this plug. But insulation on other wires in the plug seemed to be okay, and I got the rear lights working after cleaning the ground connection at the rear light (which came through a rusty screw holding the housing on), and decided to leave the hard to reach plug wires alone as long as things worked.

JRMunn

Re: Brake light issue
 

I just recently went though this. Go read the part of Jolly's site titled "Park/Tail/Stop Light Trouble Shooting"
it gives really good trouble shooting help...

Re: Brake light issue
 

Thanks guys,
I was working on the truck the other day, about the time you were posting this... I stumbled on the conclusion the the turn signal switch in the column is the last possible point of failure. Which of course would have been easier to find had I read Jollys article first.

Now I just have to source the correct (turn signal) indicator switch. Sounds like the one for '63 Chevy is the most readily available that will fit? (sorry if that's blasphemy but a driving GMC with a Chevy part is better than a non driving GMC right)

Re: Brake light issue
 

Id try to duplicate what was in there, especially if you know if it was working at some point. IIRC the 63 chevy switch was supposed to work on 63-66 GMCs
when I looked at my '63 it wasn't like anything I saw online, Chevy or GMC. I did find an OEM part on ebay that looks correct. It was for a medium duty truck.

Re: Brake light issue
 

Hey all, thanks for the help.

Just wanted to provide some feedback: I installed a new turn signal switch the other day and everything works as it should.


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Re: Brake light issue
 

Just more follow up onfo...
I installed a '63 after market turn signal switch from Brothers (part no. SWTS063).
There was earlier discussion about which Chevy years would work with what GMC years, so there you go.

I works fine, the left cancel tab is a little weak and let's the signal go off with very little wheel movement. I suspect reinstalling the wheel on the drive shaft may help but I haven't got to it yet.
Thanks for everybody's help.