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Bulb failure light on at all times, even with lights off 200 1980

Hoping to see if folks here have some preliminary guesses on an issue with my '80 265 before I start digging in.

This car's bulb failure indicator light illuminates at all times whenever the ignition is on. This includes when all the lights are *off* (including brake lights). All the lights work fine. This problem has been present since I got the car earlier this year.

A brief study of the wiring diagram suggests the only way this warning light could be lit without any of the lighting circuits being energized would be if the bulb check relay has failed or if there were a short to ground between the cluster and the relay.

Anyone seen a bulb check relay fail this way before, or have any other thoughts?

Thanks in advance.

George
--
George, Seattle WA








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    Bulb failure light on at all times, even with lights off 200 1980

    Hi George,

    Although perhaps not the most common failure mode, a faulty Bulb Failure Warning Sensor is the likely reason for the condition you see. Simply reach under your dash, feel for the "can" and unplug it. Try again. Of course the monitored lighting will not operate, but if the warning lamp is no longer lighted, you can rule out a pinched wire or fault in the cluster.

    With a 1980 so new to you, there's also a general possibility it has had some monkey business in its repair history, so unless you know its life history, keep the technician-induced causes in mind while you troubleshoot. Otherwise, swapping in a new or good used "relay" will fix you right up.

    If you're into details, open it up. The coils you see inside will have tiny glass reed switches inside them. If one is cracked (likely if someone else opened it before you) that would explain why it is lighting the warning lamp. Any one of them could do it.

    P.S. One of the technician-induced scenarios could be, I might guess, that a newer, post-1985 style sensor was tried as a replacement. Yours should be black and p/n 1362278.
    --
    Art Benstein near Baltimore

    "The more people I meet, the more I like my dog"








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      Bulb failure light on at all times, even with lights off 200 1980

      Art,

      Thanks again; confirming that, as you suspected, the original bulb failure sensor (mine had a metal case in fact, not black) had failed and was the cause of this symptom. Unplugging turned the light off and replacing with a good one from ye olde box of switches and relays (think it came out of an '84 760) restored everything to proper function.

      Much appreciated!
      --
      George, Seattle WA








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      Bulb failure light on at all times, even with lights off 200 1980

      Thanks; I too had considered the possibility of tampering by previous owners or mechanics, but it looks like the only way that could create this particular problem would be if someone did some fairly involved hacking, likely requiring clipping of wires, etc. I don't think you could simply plug something in the wrong way to achieve this result, though we'll see what I find. When I bought this car this past spring, the last active registration on it was from 1994 (!), so despite being 35 years old, its service history and exposure to attempted repairs and tinkering is shorter than you might expect. Yet nevertheless I have seen a few wires with masking tape labels on them in my brief glance under the dash so I do know I'm not the first person to be poking my head under there. And there are enough other electrical quirks in this car that I won't be surprised to find at least a few wires going where they shouldn't.

      Regardless, sounds like sensor is the first candidate here... I'll report my findings when I see what's going on. Thanks again for the input.
      --
      George, Seattle WA







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