am having a pesky problem with my 1966 Dodge Dart 270. my left turn signal indicator that is my dash board works perfectly. Everytime I turn left I can see the little green light come on and blink, but when i turn right nothing. All the exterior lights work perfectly. The front blinker is working, and the rear blinker is working. All my exterior bulbs are working properly. The bulb in the dash itself is brand new, but it still doesnt work. Before i pull the steering wheel and pull the dash to replace and clean everything, is there anything I should address? replace my fuses (which i checked are all good).?


I need some help..


thanks friends


Caesar

I had the same problem on my 65 Valiant.Assuming that you have cleaned ( carefully scrapping with a small screwdriver on the back of the circuit board where the bulb holder makes contact with the circuit board contact strip) the back of the circuit board on the instrument panel of any corrosion.If that doesn't work.Your problem may lye in the turn signal switch itself.Due to wear and age the contacts in the turn signal switch may be worn.Try jiggling the turn signal arm and see if the bulb temporary works.I had to replace the entire turn signal switch
Good Luck

Can't be turn signal switch if the exterior bulbs work.

I vote for dirty circuit board contacts or broken socket. Bend the contacts of the socket up a little bit so there is some more tension on the board. Also, trace the lines back and run some wires from a battery (even a 9v should work), taking the wires and touching them on the copper lines - the bulb should light, and that way you can elimiate the bulb > pcboard junction as an issue.

Oilbrown....DO NOT "scrape" on the traces of your circuit board to clean up any problem areas. That copper tracing is rather thin, and easily damaged. To clean those up, use a standard pencil eraser. Yep, mildly abrasive, and does a good job.

I gotta side with Pierre.....if that right turn signal works outside, then the T/S switch is ok. It's almost GOTTA be a socket or corroded board trace.

Roger

Pencil eraser... how macgyver like

If you do end up lifting a trace, you can repair it with solder then tack it down with crazy glue.

i should have mentioned that my turn signal switch is brand new. the old one broke when i "exited stage left" and never worked again. i pulled the steering wheel and tiny little plastic pieces just dropped out, it was awesome.

anyhow. i will be pulling the dash (and steering wheel if I have to get it out of the way) and cleaning the back MacGyver style so that the contacts are good.

On my '73 I cleaned the board with 180 grit sandpaper, and now all my bulbs work very well, but i wont do that again since the copper is truly that thin.

thanks for the help guys.

take care.

Caesar

I pulled the dash and the cluster. I cleaned all surfaces and ensured all my bulbs are intact and working.

I actually moved a bulb and socket from a hole where I KNEW it was working before and placed that one in the right side blinker indicator hole. I let the LEFT turn signal bulb and socket alone in the hole since it was working 100% when I pulled the dash cluster.

i replaced everything and bolted it all in place, and reconnected my battery. NOW the right indicator blinker works, but the left indicator does not. What the hell?

did i mess something up? all my exterior turn signal lights work perfectly and they did before. what gives?

Caesar

Which bulb/socket did you swap? If you changed the left and right bulb/socket around, and now the left doesn't work, then the problem sounds like its the socket itself, since you already replaced the bulbs

The dash/gauges can be very finicky - but you'll get it soon enough. I had to take my dashboard in and out a bagillion times before it was working right. I just wish those darn bulbs can be easily accessed from underneath.

Sounds like a bad ground somewhere. Mysterious light problems are more often than not, a result of bad grounds.

well the good news is this:
all my lights in the dash are working perfectly.
cleaned all the grounds and they are styling.

bad news:
temperature gauge is not working right now (it wasnt before anyway).

My temp gauge NEVER worked, then one day like a good Dodge owner I went and bought a new sending unit, and KaBaM I can see the temp of my engine. The gauge worked perfectly. The wiring harness on the engine side of the firewall is all brand-new as well.

then about 2 weeks ago, the gauge stops working perfectly. It begins to jump as it reads (it always jumped, but now it makes LARGE jumps). now it only jumps when I turn the ignition to on, but once the car is running it goes down all the way to the left (cold side). Once the car is warmed up, it still stays on the far left (as it did before I replaced the sending unit). My neighbor said it could be a bad ground, but i cleaned and checked all the grounds on the back of the dash instrument cluster. that being said I am kind of stumped for now. I really dont want to pull the dash again without having a real good idea as to what I am doing. also when I pulled the dash I noticed that the temp gauge looked like it had seen some bad mileage compared to the fuel gauge. They are setup the exact (and I mean exact) same way, but the temp one looks more beatup. Is it possible the gauge is bad? if so does ANYONE have any idea what to do about a bad 40 year old gauge? I want to keep the original gauges, i would prefer not to buy a second temp gauge while I have a dead one in the dash.


help.!!!

Caesar

I had to replace my temp gage also. I found a slightly newer Valiant in a yard and pulled the gage and sending unit. my sender didn't read correctly with the later gage.
It turned out when my gas gage and temp gages quit the copper had indeed pulled up. I had to replace the board. I used a cordless dremmel on low(7500rpm) and a brass brush to clean up all the contact points on the junk yard board. Every thing works great now.

_________________

The factory fuel, oil, & temp gauges are the mechanically the same except for the face - if you can find another you can carefully swap faces. It is very hard to fix the internals - the bimetallic strip may have fractured or the windings gone bad, but I've seen places in the Mopar mags advertise that that can fix them.

A standard 12V test light connected in place of the sender should make the gauge read somewhere around LOW and the light should blink around 1 Hz. Senders should be around the 10 (high) to 77 ohm (low) range.

i will test the sender, and as far as the bimetallic strips and wire windings, they looked pretty bad compared to the fuel gauge setup. and you are correct, they are the same except for the increments painted on them. I am tempted to just find on ebay a new in the box gauge. It isnt super urgent to fix, since it didnt work for almost 80% of the time i have had the car.

I will keep you all updated, and also keep the ideas coming.

also, who claims they can fix them? I would be interested in trying that out.

thanks again

Caesar