Taillights '54 Kaiser

[Bob G]

Took the taillights and housings off my '54 in order to clean them up and paint the fixtures silver on the inside to assist with brightness. After reassembly the right side light is now brighter than the left side until the brakes are applied and then the left side is brighter while the right side dims to the running light brightness. Did I maybe reconnect the wire and bulb to the right one wrong, which if I did not sure how.

[kaiserfrazerlibrary]

You msy have created a ground issue when you removed the housings from the car.  The fact that electrical balance (applying the brakes and getting brake lights) causes changes to the lights for brightness.  You should check the socket to mke sure your grounds are good.

[Fid]

I agree that it is likely a grounding issue.  The chrome on the tail light bodies does not always contact corroded/patina-ed body mountings tightly when reinstalled. I use star washers on them so they "bite" into the metal and make contact. That makes a huge difference. This is major plague with the later Henry Js which have the tail lights on the fender crowns - there just isn't enough "meat" there for them to ground properly so the star washers really help.

[Bob G]

Checked grounding which seemed fine. Determined the problem to be the bulb(s). Tried three of them, all are used, from my supply and the last one worked with the only difference being that neither of the two contacts on the bulb was dimpled (indented). All of the others tried had one dimpled contact and one rounded contact. Thanks for the advice for the next go round.

[sunseeker]

Sometimes bulb sockets are not indexed so you may have inserted one of the bulbs with the brake filament going to the tail light wire.