I hope someone on here has corrected a similar problem to mine because I am stumped. I have a 56 Victoria that I have driven regularly for three years. Lately, when I put on the right turn signal the right rear taillight blinks. However, the tag light blinks with it and the left tailight also blinks faintly. When I put on the left turn signal, the left rear blinks as it should and the right rear light and tag light don't blink. Through all of this, the front parklamps blink correctly. On top of all this, when I depress my brake pedal, I notice that the speedometer part of my gauge cluster lights up and goes out when the brake pedal comes up.  So far I have replaced the turn signal switch with a NOS FoMoCo switch that did not solve the problem. I dropped the headlight switch down and examined it and around it for obvious burnt or shorted wires. I hate to throw more money at it and hope someone can help me with advice. Also, a thank you to Ted Eaton who removed the glitch that kept me from posting on this site.

check all your lites for a good ground  shakey

I shined up a spot on the rear of the frame and ran jumper wires that I connected to a mounting stud on each tail light and connected the other ends to the frame. I also ran a jumper wire from a mounting screw on the tag light to the same spot on the frame. It didn't solve the problem.

Did you try grounding the front parking lights?


54 Victoria 312;  48 Ford Conv 302, 56 Bird 312
Forever Ford
Midland Park, NJ

They are blinking just fine and I did not think of running  an augzillary ground from them. Now that you mention it, when I built this car several years I replaced the front parklamp sockets and wiring assemblies with reproduction units. When I installed the new parklamp sockets into the holes in the potmetal parklamp castings, they were a very loose fit in the holes. To make a tighter fit, I stripped some copper wiring that I had and wound some around the new sockets to make them fit tighter in the holes. Being that the parklamp housings are pot metal, should I try to run a jumper wire from the rear of the parklamp sockets to a metal part of the front clip? Did I also mention that when I depress my brake pedal, the light inside my speedometer gauge lights up?

I had similar problems when I had one of my rear tail/brake light connectors wired backwards.  Probably not your issue, but thought I'd mention it just in case you had done any rewiring to the fixtures.

Dan   You nailed it!  I pulled out the right rear taillight bulb and couldn't see where it was obviously burnt. I tried a different bulb anyway and the problem was solved. My speedometer guage light has even quit flashing when I put on the brakes.   Thanks

Dan the man!



"Came too close to dying to stop living now!"

I bought halogens at an Auto Zone and they are a lot better than 1157's and did not affect the turn signals.

56 Vic, B'Ville 200 MPH Club Member, So Cal.