Amber brake lights?

[ptimhere]

We've been working on my son's new to him XJ. Its been 2 months of upgrading/repairing things that had been waiting to be done. Its a 2001 Limited.

One of the upgrades was to put in LED brake lights and backup lights. This was done initially when I thought we had a bad bulb because the passenger side running/brake light wasn't working. That turned out to be a wiring issue at the harness in the rear quarter. The quarter panel had rusted through ages ago and the harness was badly corroded. I patched the brake wire and it all was well because the running light now worked.

As I was following him on a test drive today, I noticed something weird.

When he hits his brakes, the ambers come on.

His running lights work. And his turn signals work. But his brakes are turning on the ambers and I don't know why. Any thoughts?

peace, tim

 

[lawagoneer]

First double check your wiring. If that's good then it may be the LED bulbs back feeding the circuit. Older style LED bulbs are prone to doing this. I had the same problem when I did my LED upgrade a couple of years ago. I added diodes to the feed to stop the back feed. Frustrating to diagnos, took a little thinking on how to repair. You can use resistors sold as "load equalizers" but that deletes the purpose of adding LEDS. Here's a link to my journey, http://www.cherokeetalk.com/forum/f20/turn-signals-possessed-40801/

 

[N8N_99xj]

Do you have a trailer adapter on this vehicle? Do the front turn signals come on too? Do the turn signals work correctly?

 

[old_man]

Don't know about newer rigs, but Renix tail lights have a issue that you can accidentally swap the bulbs/sockets to the wrong holes in the tail lights.

 

[clydefrog]

Definitely sounds like a ground issue. Do the brake lights AND the turn lights come on? If so it sounds like the ground is missing for the brake lights and is pulling it from the turns, also could be an issue with the trailer wiring if you have a trailer control box installed.

 

[ptimhere]

Ok, here's what I've got up to date -

After double checking the grounds, all the lights are working on the driver side.

On the passenger side, however, when he hits the brakes, only the amber light comes on and not the red. On the drivers side, both amber and red come on.

I will probably try to pull the rear panel off tomorrow and see if there are any other broken wires at the harness. That's my only guess.

Thanks for the help everyone.

 

[N8N_99xj]

have you tried putting incandescent bulbs back in? What happens when you put on the 4-ways or turn signals?

When you pull the panels off, pull the one behind the rear tire, if there's a trailer connector it splices in there.

 

[ptimhere]

I was sick yesterday, so just played with it a bit today.

It appears it was mismatched led bulbs. I had two different sets in there, both sylvania. One was a good led, the other was a "better" led. Either way, I can leave one matching set in and everything works as it should. As soon as I put the other set in at the same time, that's when I get ambers and reds coming on together for brakes.

So, for now, I will just keep one set in and I may see about getting a matching set to see if that makes a difference.

 

[Johnnie Walker]

You may need to install 'load equalizer' or diodes.

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