Brakes interfering with R/H indicator?

[GillyD]

My o/h tells me that when I brake at a junction and indicate right, I get lots of flashing lights but nothing useful to indicate where I'm going! (He was driving behind me). Can anyone indicate an obvious cause/solution (I'm thinking earthing issue). If I'm not braking, there's no problem - anyone got any ideas?

[Steve_D]

Exactly as you say......an earth fault.
When a lamp can't find a direct earth the current will pass through the filament of another (or the same) lamp to find an earth which is why a number of lamps can light up.
It may simply be the body of that lamp or its holder has corrosion and needs cleaning.

Steve

[GillyD]

Many thanks - I shall have a bit of a looksee.

[DaveWesty]

+1
Probably in the rear light cluster. Corrosion on a bulb holder or the connection to the wiring loom.

[Mellow Yellow]

It's worth checking the tail light bulbs. Assuming it has the standard Cavalier tail lights, they use a '566' 12v 21w/4w stop/tail light bulb. It's unusual in that the terminal pins are not opposite one another, if you view it from the base; they're at 12 o'clock and 5 o'clock. They often get mistakenly replaced with the far more common '380' 21w/5w which has terminal pins at 12 o'clock and 6 o'clock if viewed from the base; both have pins with the same vertical offset and the 380 will fit the connector with minimal effort. The 380 will usually give working tail lights but no brake lights, but I guess it could cause other issues. If your tail/stop light bulbs are marked 21w/5w they're the wrong ones.