Jim Koepke
04-18-2011, 11:37 PM
About a week ago we were driving home from Oregon because the road was closed into our local town.
For the story on that see:
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?163796-When-One-Road-Closes%85
It was dark and while we were driving the headlights decided to have a bit of fun. When I went from high beam to low beam, it went dark.
I said, "that's not right."
My wife thought I was playing around.
The high beams would come on and stay on, but no low beams.
So today I am looking at this and trying to figure out how to trouble shoot and take it apart.
I liked the old days when there was just a big switch on the floor to change the beams and it cost about $3 for a new one. Now days there is a fancy switch on the steering column that works the lights, the wipers, the turn signals, the four way flashers and the cruise control on some cars. If only it made coffee.
Of course, today's switch that can do so many things is going to be about $200 unless you find it at a discount for $29.99. Still a lot more than that old fashioned $3 floor switch.
Besides you can't even take it apart if you do not have the star drivers and the special star drivers with the hole in the center. Good thing I do not get rid of tools I don't think I will ever use again.
I looked all kinds of places for more information on this, but from all that is going on, it seems it is this "super" switch that is going south.
For a while before the head light problem, the four way flashers have not been right. They all blink but the passenger side arrow on the instrument panel and sometimes the front passenger side marker light decide to take a nap.
The turn signal seems to work most of the time, but sometimes it was a rapid blink when the signal was set for a right turn.
Then the head light thing happened. I have found that pulling back the lever with the high beams on, but not pulling it all the way, the low beams come on. If it is let go at that point, I can get the low beams stay on. Kind of dicey for regular on road use.
Another reason to make me think something mechanical has gone wrong inside the switch. It is kind of intimidating in all its sealed plasticness. When I was young and broke, I would likely take it apart and try to fix it. Most of the time I was pretty lucky with that kind of thing. In those days, switches were switches and didn't come with so many bells and whistles. This super cluster switch with its bits of electronics, cams, gears and levers could be more than even the most accomplished tinkerer might tackle without breaking some delicate part that was meant to do nothing other than to go ka-boing and make little pieces of switch fly every which way.
So, I guess a day or two more will be spent searching the car forums before ordering a new switch and then putting my truck back together.
Then I'll take that sucker apart just to see if I could have fixed it.
jtk
For the story on that see:
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?163796-When-One-Road-Closes%85
It was dark and while we were driving the headlights decided to have a bit of fun. When I went from high beam to low beam, it went dark.
I said, "that's not right."
My wife thought I was playing around.
The high beams would come on and stay on, but no low beams.
So today I am looking at this and trying to figure out how to trouble shoot and take it apart.
I liked the old days when there was just a big switch on the floor to change the beams and it cost about $3 for a new one. Now days there is a fancy switch on the steering column that works the lights, the wipers, the turn signals, the four way flashers and the cruise control on some cars. If only it made coffee.
Of course, today's switch that can do so many things is going to be about $200 unless you find it at a discount for $29.99. Still a lot more than that old fashioned $3 floor switch.
Besides you can't even take it apart if you do not have the star drivers and the special star drivers with the hole in the center. Good thing I do not get rid of tools I don't think I will ever use again.
I looked all kinds of places for more information on this, but from all that is going on, it seems it is this "super" switch that is going south.
For a while before the head light problem, the four way flashers have not been right. They all blink but the passenger side arrow on the instrument panel and sometimes the front passenger side marker light decide to take a nap.
The turn signal seems to work most of the time, but sometimes it was a rapid blink when the signal was set for a right turn.
Then the head light thing happened. I have found that pulling back the lever with the high beams on, but not pulling it all the way, the low beams come on. If it is let go at that point, I can get the low beams stay on. Kind of dicey for regular on road use.
Another reason to make me think something mechanical has gone wrong inside the switch. It is kind of intimidating in all its sealed plasticness. When I was young and broke, I would likely take it apart and try to fix it. Most of the time I was pretty lucky with that kind of thing. In those days, switches were switches and didn't come with so many bells and whistles. This super cluster switch with its bits of electronics, cams, gears and levers could be more than even the most accomplished tinkerer might tackle without breaking some delicate part that was meant to do nothing other than to go ka-boing and make little pieces of switch fly every which way.
So, I guess a day or two more will be spent searching the car forums before ordering a new switch and then putting my truck back together.
Then I'll take that sucker apart just to see if I could have fixed it.
jtk