Quick PSA: Your "burnt" blinker bulb may not be burnt, but just not making contact.
05-15-2007, 09:16 AM
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Quick PSA: Your "burnt" blinker bulb may not be burnt, but just not making contact.
At 50k, our cars are designed to eat up every bulb on the back of the car. It's just what they do...sort of like your sig other getting fat and letting go after she's been married to you for awhile (if you let her...) but I digress.
So anyway...the taillight bulbs...a couple went out, had the dealer swap em for me, swapped one myself...but they kept going out.
So then I decided to kick my taillight assembly in frustration and it fixed it!
So, the moral of the story is that the spring making contact with the bulb gets depressed over time and contact becomes shotty. Just pull out the taillight by uncapping that round circle on the left and right corners of the inside of the trunk, unscrewing/bolting the screw/bolt in there (use a socket wrench so as not to strip the screw head), pull out the assembly (very easy, 5 mins), pull out the bulb giving you headaches, and use pliers to pull up the spring underneath the bulb making contact. Pull gently, and only a bit, for it'll be more than enough.
Just be careful on putting the bulb assembly back in the plastic tail lamp in that it's a tight fit and you don't want to push it.
So anyway...the taillight bulbs...a couple went out, had the dealer swap em for me, swapped one myself...but they kept going out.
So then I decided to kick my taillight assembly in frustration and it fixed it!
So, the moral of the story is that the spring making contact with the bulb gets depressed over time and contact becomes shotty. Just pull out the taillight by uncapping that round circle on the left and right corners of the inside of the trunk, unscrewing/bolting the screw/bolt in there (use a socket wrench so as not to strip the screw head), pull out the assembly (very easy, 5 mins), pull out the bulb giving you headaches, and use pliers to pull up the spring underneath the bulb making contact. Pull gently, and only a bit, for it'll be more than enough.
Just be careful on putting the bulb assembly back in the plastic tail lamp in that it's a tight fit and you don't want to push it.
05-15-2007, 09:34 AM
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good point. 2 weeks ago. I got the dash alert that a bulb had "burnt out". Next time I started,
it up, the fault went away. I did a check the old fashioned way and walked around the back and actually looked and all were lit.
have 62k
have 62k
05-15-2007, 09:37 AM
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Ya, I'm at 65k...downhill from 50 on ;-)
no offense to bpp..talking cars here 
Hell, a few of my good friends are pushing 50 right now...and they definitely don't look it or act it.
hello bay area guys
Hell, a few of my good friends are pushing 50 right now...and they definitely don't look it or act it.
hello bay area guys
