LED bulbs front turn signal problem

[Dukeboy]

My turn signals work fine with incandescents, I purchased LED bulbs for any bulb that signaled. Rear lights work fine. When I replace the front bulbs with LED's the side marker/signal lights wouldn't work at all. So I put the filament bulbs back in the side marker/signal lights. Then the lights for each side would work flashing together. However when I turn on the headlamps they would stop working and the dash indicator lights would illuminate as well. Is this because a diode will only flow one direction and the circuit requires it to go the other way to alternate the front signal and side marker/signals when the headlights are on? If so can I rewire the side marker/signal lamps to make them work another way? If all else fails the filaments will go back in but I'd like to find a another solution.
Thanks in advance

 

[forest522]

I am pretty sure you have to replace your flasher with an electronic flasher. Not heavy duty, just electronic. Oh, and its pretty cheap, less than 10 bucks.

 

[212sparky]

Leds dont draw enough to make the old flasher work.

 

[Dukeboy]

I have an electronic flasher, The LED's only stop working when the headlights are turned on, otherwise they flash correctly.
Thanks again.

 

[212sparky]

Ground issue?

 

[MarcusOReallyus]

Ground issue?

Ground issue. First place to look when electrical stuff gets weird.

 

[AJMBLAZER]

Check the driver's side running light. The one under the headlight next to the grill. They're famous for getting corrosion in them and this causing ground issues. What you've described is one of the classic setups for this.

 

[Dukeboy]

Thankyou, I will recheck grounds and plugs. The part that has me confused is if I switch back and forth from using LED's and Filament bulbs in the front marker lights is that the filaments work fine, The LED's don't when the headlights are on. Headlights off both work fine. I would think the ground issues would cause both to not function properly, but I can easily be wrong. I'll do more tests.

 

[AJMBLAZER]

Might be something to do with the bulbs and connectors themselves. I know sometimes with that front light socket it's just that the socket is rusty. Some guys over on www.ColoradoK5.com have had luck just cleaning the rusty socket up. Maybe the old bulbs fit into the "clean" grove in the rust and the LED bulbs don't?
Hard to say with weird electrical gremlins on 20+ year old trucks.

 

[Dukeboy]

Good idea about the groove, will check when I get home. haven't been on CK5 in years, about the same time my K5 broke and I started the conversion.

 

[Barrman]

The ground tab on the front marker lights probably broke off. You can bend it in to touch the bulb case, but putting in a new socket is best.

 

[Speddmon]

Ditto to what Barrman said. Both of the grounding tabs on my front sockets were cracked. They were still in place but cracked, causing a high resistance ground situation. The flashers would work just fine until you turned on the parking lights. With the other lights on, the path of least resistance to ground was not through the sockets like it should be, but through the other bulbs.

 

[Dukeboy]

replacing the sockets as we speak, thanks again. I'll update with results.

 

[Speddmon]

Were they bad or are you just replacing them for the sake of replacing them??

 

[Dukeboy]

The contacts were loose and the wiring directly coming out of the socket was brittle, replaced about 8" of wiring with the new sockets. The bulbs fit better but same situation, LED's and filament bulbs both work fine with headlights off. Turn headlights on and LED's stop flashing, all "marker" lights just glow including both turn signal indicators. remove side marker bulbs and everything works again, I still think it has something to do with LED's only working in one direction. still looking.

 

[MarcusOReallyus]

Grounds. Check your ground paths with a METER.

NOT your eyeball!

Disconnect your battery's ground connections, and meter from the socket to the ground terminal on the battery cable. That's a complete end-to-end ground path check. Do it for each socket.

 

[Speddmon]

You still have a ground issue...the path of least resistance is still through the other bulbs rather than through the ground.

There are a bunch of them to look at. One on each side of the radiator on the core support, one on the frame rail below the front battery, one inside the cab up beside the e-brake pedal. The ones in the back shouldn't be too far from the rear tail lights, but I can't say exactly where they are. There are probably more, but those are the main ones to look at right away.

 

[Dukeboy]

Agreed on the ground issue, still looking.
And yes I'm using a meter. Also a power probe master kit, cool tool by the way.

 

[Dukeboy]

Not quite sure how it caused my problem, but I traced my wiring back to a faulty headlight switch, I'll replace it tomorrow and see if it was the culprit.

 

[MarcusOReallyus]

Might be. Might also be just one more layer on the onion. Sometimes you got to just peel them one at a time.

So, don't get discouraged if that doesn't do it. Hang in there.

Have you checked those grounds yet?