Interesting Foglight problem

Hello,

It's been a while since I've posted, hopefully will be back posting more again soon.

I'm preparing my 1992 90 for a registration inspection, so was going through things making sure everything was ok. One thing i've noticed is the rear Fog light.....the light itself works, but the telltale on the dash doesn't. I've checked the bulb, and also with a multi meter, there's no power going to the bulb on the dash.

The actual fog light works fine, and turns on/off with the fog light switch (there was an issue with the switch....i cleaned up the contacts in the switch and then put on some petroleum jelly....)

Any ideas where to look? Ideally i want to avoid pulling the dash to bits, if possible

MAY HELP

Contacts in the bulb holder.

Thanks ... it's certainly easier to read with colours too Vs black and white in Haynes.

i'll check contacts again tonight....just found out that i need to swap sides for the fog light and reverse light....so see what happens with this issue when i do that

Dont use petroleum jelly on electrical contacts, have you got a power probe to power up the circuit?

So I swapped the reverse and fog light and the issue remains.

To confirm, the fog light itself works....it's just the light on the dash. When I searched before posting it seems the most common issue is either both dash and actual light bit working ....or both being on all the time.

I checked again for voltage at the connector behind the dash that plugs into the dash lights....there's nothing.

I’d start tracing back the red/yellow wire and black earth wire from the back of the telltale and see where they go. Bit of a ball ache, but needs must.

Or you could power it up from the switch end.

bluedog333 said:

I’d start tracing back the red/yellow wire and black earth wire from the back of the telltale and see where they go. Bit of a ball ache, but needs must.

Click to expand...

It sounds like i'll have to do that

nobber said:

Or you could power it up from the switch end.

Click to expand...

Do you mean just disconnecting the switch, and putting 12v into the bit from the loom that will not be live? (im assuming if i use a multi meter one bit of the connector that goes to the switch will be live, and the other not.

Check for a good earth at the telltale lamp

gse1986 said:

It sounds like i'll have to do that

Click to expand...

It’s not too bad a job, you know there’s power coming out of the switch because the lamp turns on. There’s only a sort distance between the switch and the telltale, you just need to find what’s not connected properly, it may be where the red/yellow wire splits into two after the switch, it may be the earth for the telltale. You should be able to see the wire divider behind the three switch panel by your right knee ( hazards etc ). Here it is on mine, it’s where the shiny scissor blade is pointing.

I have the exact same issue. At one point I knew both dash light and fog light worked, but I rarely use the fog light, so the one time I came to use it the dash light did not show it working. I assumed it was just the switch so kept pressing it and no luck. When I arrived at work I tested the fog light I realised the actual light worked but the dash light did not..... sorry to whoever I was flashing with my fog light for 5 miles....

Its not something that hugely bothers me, I guess I will have to take a look at it for the MOT.

Very rarely the dash light does work so I know the bulb is okay. I am thinking its a dodgey earth (everything about my landy is dodgey) or a loose connection somewhere.

So, i had another go today, and now all seems well again.

Unfortunately, i am not 100% sure what the problem was....

I tested the lamps before i started, just to make sure that the fog light telltale was indeed still not working, whilst the actual external light was. That was still the same, so good to continue.

I then took the steering wheel off to get better access, and took out the dash. I traced the wire from the telltale to the connector for the switch. I did a continuity test from the wire to the connector, and there was a connection..but when i checked the voltage (whilst fog light outside was on)....and there was 0v...which confused me. I swapped the telltale bulbs between the side light and fog light, and that was still working fine (ie the fog light telltale bulb worked fine in the side light telltale), however the fog light telltale was still off. So i took out the dash light bit, and cleaned up contacts, took all bulbs out and then put back in.....then everything started working. Even voltage tests from "before" the telltale.

I wonder if there's some funny or lose wire somewhere, or perhaps wire is broken within the cable....but no matter how much moving around, could i get the telltale to stop working.

I'm going to keep an eye on it, but for the time being will consider it "fixed", especially since it worked fine for years before.

During the week I also took the landy for the registration inspection, this isn't really an MOT, but rather checks that the vehicle fulfills requirements to be registered in Sweden, as such light functionality wasn't checked, but just that the lights were in the right place and the right lights were there (among other things).

Good news was it pretty much passed. I say pretty much, because it failed....but on things i wasn't aware of that needed to be in place.

The three things I need to sort are:

• Remove bullbar if there isn't any lights on it (i had lights, they were well passed their best, so decided to remove them and buy some new....haven't done that yet, so am temporarily removing it until i have the time to fit and wire up the lights. My aim is to try and get it all registered and sorted before 29th, incase brexit really does happen....
• Fit a load guard between the drivers seat and the rear load area......i am trying to work out best way to do this, might order a dog guard
• Fit four load hooks to the rear load area

So hopefully i can get these sorted quickly, and then get it properly registered

Are you reging it as a commercial? sounds like the test I did here in Portugal..

I don't have any choice....as far as Sweden is concerned (just realised i didn't mention that bit ), the landy is designed for goods rather than people. If i had seats in the back it would be a people car (personbil), but since i don't have seats it's a light goods vehicle (lätt lastbil). That means it has to have this guard and tie down hooks. It seems good, though, since it means the tax should be significantly lower (i've heard figures of 700 odd quid for a people car, and just over 100 quid for a light goods vehicle).

My 101 forward control could have been either but as it's only got 2 front seats could qualify as comercial saving a 14,000€ tax charge when matriculating as it's zero here for comercial..