help with rear offside indicator

[travelling_man]

i've got a bit of a weird one, yesterday my rear indicator stopped working, chacked bulb by swapping over, no difference. checked at the connector and was getting the same voltage as the working one cycling upto about 9 volts.
checked with the bulb out and get the same voltage as the working one, but when the bulb is in the voltage goes down to about one tenth, cleaned connectors checked resistance getting the same readings as the working one, its only when i put the bulb in that the voltage drops. the bulb does work swapped over with the working one. What is the back bulb holder off, mines a 96 chim, i assume its a ford fiesta jobby, but where would i get hold of one of these? or is there something i'm missing?

any help would be much appreciated as always, its doing my swede in

[paulathome]

Mike,
I would suspect either a poor earth or more likely a high resistance in the feed to the rear lights on that side.
Pull your drivers seat forward and look in the flap in the side behind the door where the door lock mechanism is situated. In here you will find a wiring loom with several multi way connectors, one of these feeds the rear lights. See if you can work out which connector goes to the rear lights and disconnect and clean all the contacts in both plug and socket.
Then check your lights again if they still don't work then it may be an earth fault. However I can't remember where the earth is located on that side. (Near the fuel pump?) I'm sure someone else will come along and tell us however.
Let us know how you get on.
Cheers.
Paul.

[Cider Andy]

You should be getting a 12V reading at the lamps, even the one that you say is working properly. With the engine on I would expect it to be around 13V.

paulathome's reply is spot on: there's a point of high resistance somewhere in the circuit and the most likely places are at the lamp cluster or a connector in the 'B' pillar.

[philmccann]

Hi there

The guys are spot-on. Look for a problem on the feed side. If there is a high resistance in the feed, then as soon as the lamp lights and draws current then the voltage will die.

Cheers

Phil

[spend]

Are you sure about that? The elictrickery of flashers and errant earths seems to have caused a lot confustication in the past. I'd check the earths (as a matter of course/service anyway), and even contemplate removing other bulbs on that side.

Dave

[travelling_man]

youre not going to believe this, i had the buld holder out in the house all weekend, went to try what spend said without all the bulbs in and it worked, put the rest of the bulbs in and it still works??????

it does seem to be quite damp in the boot, where does the water get in?
i've also ordered a new ns cluster for a 96 chim, so i'm building up my spares!!!
anybody know where all the aerth points are as i thought i woulg give em a clean and a squirt
thanks for the help

michael

[Cider Andy]

Good news! It will have been a bad connection at the lamp cluster, probably caused (and certainly not helped) by the dampness in the boot.

It's a good idea to clean up the lampholders, lamps and connectors with a rag with WD40 on it.

[travelling_man]

but thats the thing andy, i did all that on saturday m orning and it didnt make a difference, the only thing i have done is paulled out the wiring behind the passenger seat and put it back in again?