I need help here. Who would think a dome light could be so challenging?! I thought this was going to be a quick project. However there was no bulb in the new dome light I purchased.

The new and old sockets are the same, and neither one match the bulb that was in there, nor the bulb I bought thinking it was the correct one. There are two contacts in the socket. I assume one is for the door jamb switch, and the other is for the headlight switch actuation of the dome light. However, the bulb I thought fit into this application has only one centered contact. It has a pair of low bayonets on the case. Both the old bulb, and the new one have 97 stamped on the side. This seems like the wrong combination to me. I bench tested the bulb and socket, and the single contact on the bulk actually spreads the the spring loaded contacts against the socket base, which would be a ground, and would blow a fuse for sure. The old one never worked in the 23 years I have owned the car. I do not know why it did not blow a fuse before. I wonder if some "mechanic" simply unplugged the harness to kill it after he blew a fuse.

I could not decipher the wiring diagram in the FSM. The connector shown for the dome light should show up on the body wiring page, or the dash board page, but I cannot find it. Also, the wiring colors of the old socket do not match either the new socket or the FSM diagrams. The two wires on the new one are pink and yellow. The old socket has two black wires. I have already clipped out the old dome light fitting. There really was nothing wrong with the old one that I could see, I just could not get the old bulb out . I suspect that is because it had the wrong bulb in it. I had to destroy it to get it out. Now that the bulb is out, it looks as if I could make it work if I had the right bulb.

Here are the questions:
1. What bulb goes in here?
2. How does this circuit work?
3. How can I test the wires now hanging from the ceiling to see if the circuit is sound?

As always, Thanks. Sam

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If my memory of the Chrysler dome light wiring philosophy is accurate, the pink wires going to the dome light fixture are actually both (+) always hot leads. The door jamb switch grounds the circuit (as does the headlight dimmer switch rotator knob), thereby completing the circuit and allowing the electrons to flow.

To test, open the door or otherwise ground the circuit, and check for (+) feed at the terminals for the dome light. Without a bulb in place you should have a completed circuit on one side of the socket only.

Rock auto says the dome light bulb is a 1004.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

OK, I am officially dumb now. The shell of the socket is always grounded with screws to the body. If both wires are hot, how can you complete the circuit with a ground that already exists. And yet I know that door switch goes to ground when the plunger is allowed to spring out.

I have do not doubt you are right here. I am just trying get a little more information. This is a circuit my simplistic electrical concepts mind cannot wrap itself around.

Sam

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It's not just you! It took me over a year to puzzle out how the circuit works. I did the interior in my brother's 83 Dodge van and it took me that long to figure out why the dome lights I installed did not work properly. I re-did his interior again several years after my first attempt and I got the wiring right the second time.

The terminals for the dome light bulb should be insulated from the body of the housing that screws to the frame. Think of the terminals in the housing as the two ends of a snipped wire in the circuit and the bulb as the splice that repairs the wire. Visualize the wire going from the + battery cable, to the dome light housing, then to the bulb, then to the ground switch. The door jamb switch grounds out and completes the circuit. There are other variables such as the dimmer switch, but the circuit I describe is the basic circuit. The dimmer switch just provides a second ground path. This is why on cars with dirty grounds the dome light will sometimes be brighter with the door open and the dimmer switch turned to make the dome lights turn on than if the dome light was turned on by the door jamb switch alone.

Just make sure that the replacement socket has the terminals insulated from the body of the housing and you should be fine.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

No, sir. One contact is for feed, and the other is for ground. The base shell of the correct bulb (#1004) has only a physical function; it is not grounded or otherwise electrically involved.

Definitely the wrong bulb.

The doom light feed wire is always hot. The ground wire runs and forks to all door switches plus the headlight switch, all of which make and break the ground path for the doom light circuit.
One wire will have continuity to ground with a door open or the headlight switch rotated fully anticlockwise. The other wire will be hot at all times.

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

Would or could the wrong bulb cause the dome light to work via dash switch, but not the door switches?

No. Sounds like you need to clean the contacts and check the wiring for the door jamb switches.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

That makes sense. Thanks. Now I wonder where the "mechanic" who put the wrong bulb in disconnected the hot feed when it blew a fuse. Any idea where the plug at the other end of the dome harness is? If Duster Idiot is right in the previous post, it is behind the kick panel. There is no post since this is a hardtop model. There must be a plug in the body harness either in the trunk or below the a pillar somewhere.

Thanks. Sam

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Check for a plug in the harness by the kick panel and under the carpet by the driver's seat.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

Sam, the yellow wire is also feeding the dome light or rather grounding the left door switch as well as the right door switch in door jamb.

I agree the dome light circuits are a bit confusing as the light is powered by two different circuits. One from the interior lighting dimmer control, and the door jamb switches.

You will find a "T" shaped connector behind left side kick panel with one pink 18 gage & one yellow 18 gage wire one feed from headlight switch's "D" terminal & the other from "B2" terminal. I think those dome light conductors pass up through the left "A" pillar to the roof and snake over to the center of the roof. As Dan said there are two ground paths, one created by each door jamb switch, and the other at the headlight switch's interior lighting dimmer switch.

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67' Dart GT Convertible; the old Chrysler Corp.
82' LeBaron Convertible; the new Chrysler Corp
07' 300 C AWD; Now by Fiat, the old new Chrysler LLC

No, sir. There is one and only one feed for the dome light. It is hot all the time.

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一期一会
Too many people who were born on third base actually believe they've hit a triple.

The door jamb switchescand dimmer switch are different GROUNDS.

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Casually looking for a Clifford hyperpak intake for cheap.

Thanks guys. Like I said, I THOUGHT this was going to be a simple task. I have not even found the right bulb yet. I will check the circuit tomorrow afternoon to see if it is hot, and if one wire is grounded. The fact that the sprung contact is so close to the bulb socket, which is ground bothers me a bit. I guess there were millions of them out there that worked for years, so I should not overthink this.

Sam

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Dan: After a second look at diagram, and 1004 bulb configuration, I think I see what I missed in previous blather above.

Headlight terminal B2 via circuit M1 pink conductor feeds 12v to one side of bulb's filament. (base of bulb is not grounded as with tail & brake light circuits.)

Path to ground from other end of bulb filament is accomplished by two circuits: M2 to door jamb switch which is open when door is shut dis allowing current flow; and M2A yellow which passes through headlight terminal D to ground. This allows operation of dome light without opening a door.

This circuit is shown in a separate detached detail, and on three different pages making it a bit hard to follow without hand drawing it on a separate sheet of paper with conductor colors which I should have done before opening my big fat mouth above. Think of yellow conductor as a ground path, and pink as 12v feed from hot side of fuse block.

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67' Dart GT Convertible; the old Chrysler Corp.
82' LeBaron Convertible; the new Chrysler Corp
07' 300 C AWD; Now by Fiat, the old new Chrysler LLC

This is really making me want to fix the dome light in my 68 Dart. Not working for a few years. Maybe in the headlight switch?

Lou

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