Need help tracking down taillight short

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New Camper - 18 Jul 2006 02:01 GMT

I have a 75 TravelMate pop-up camper that apparently has a short in the
running light wiring. All other lights are working fine, but every
time I turn on the vehicle headlights, it blows the taillight fuse in
the vehicle. I have checked the obvious grounds at the tongue and on
the taillights and checked the connections at the tongue and
taillights. It mostly looked good, but I cleaned up anything that
looked at all corroded. Initially the left turn signal/brake didn't
work either, but it works now that I cleaned everything up. How can I
track down where the short is?

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Rich256 - 18 Jul 2006 02:53 GMT

> I have a 75 TravelMate pop-up camper that apparently has a short in the
> running light wiring. All other lights are working fine, but every
[quoted text clipped - 5 lines]
> work either, but it works now that I cleaned everything up. How can I
> track down where the short is?

Probably inside one of the light sockets. You really need an ohm meter
for tracing it down. First pull all the bulbs. If the short goes away
put them back in one at a time. Short can even be inside a bulb.

The bulbs have a pretty low resistance. It will be hard to "see" the
short with all the bulbs in. Total resistance with all bulbs will
probably be about 1 ohm.

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David - 18 Jul 2006 21:32 GMT

>> I have a 75 TravelMate pop-up camper that apparently has a short in
>> the running light wiring. All other lights are working fine, but
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
> short with all the bulbs in. Total resistance with all bulbs will
> probably be about 1 ohm.

If you are blowing a fuse check the positive wire to the light fitting or it
may have chaffed on the body of the trailer - all your earth connections
should be via the plug - do not rely on the tow ball to give you earth.
IMHO
Lushy AU

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