Tail & Stop 'red' lites stopped working. Not fuses

My red stop & tail lites have stopped working. We checked all fuses in cabin & under bonnet. OK. I removed both dual filament globes but they tested perfect. As assembly is plastic, it has a separate wire to get to earth and that seems ok. Dealers also checked what we checked. Still no answer. Tow bar is fitted by Nissan dealer and is genuine. Wiring looks great. As we have to shut a gate on our acres each nite, we get to know if tail lites don't work as we use them to see to hook the gate chain. Navara is booked into the Nissan dealer for fault finding today Friday 18th Feb 2010. See how we go. Anyone had this problem? Surely it would not be them hooking the tow bar wiring with those 'Scotch™' squeeze type terminals as they should not cut the existing wiring.

I wouldn't have thought anyone would need to use squeeze terminals for the towbar connectivity. The loom for the lights has a plug in it about 6 inches from the left hand tail light, if no towbar is connected the loom remains plugged into the socket, if towbar is connected the towbar has a "Y piece" that plugs into the loom then one way separates off to the lights and the other goes off to the towbar plug. Atleast thats how it's done on mine all clean plugs and sockets and no need for any fitter to make their own connections.

I even priced the Y piece as an option to come off from the loom under the car and power the camera but in the end Nissan here reckoned there was none in the state and I couldn't be bothered waiting for them so I found alternate methods.

As Krafty said - Nissan use a nice splice loom for the wiring harness for the towbar - plugs into the loom, no cutting. It's why, when I installed my ARB bar, I kept the original Nissan wiring harness for the towbar.

Is it only the tail/stop lights not working? If everything has died it may be as simple as a wiring connector that has become disconnected under the car somewhere.

There is a fuse box under the bonnet on the left side just in front of the firewall. There is a tail light fuse in there, its a box with a lid. I dont think it says fuse box on top.

Dave.

Have you done anything with the stereo or instrument panel recently?

To answer all in one go: Thanks guys. Pleased to hear the loom is factory perfect. Nothing else has stopped working except the red ones. Tail & Stop lites. All flashers etc fine. Has not been offroad yet, nor has it been through deep water. Yes Dave, we checked that fuse and so did the dealer man. 0735 here now (Friday) and it is booked into local Nissan for 0800 so heres hoping. Will report back on Sat am. But I love the rig and can't fault it otherwise.

While it may not be likely there could still be a broken wire in the loom somewhere, anything could have happened under a car even if it doesn't go offroad.

If it was me I'd get a meter and test the globe socket, you might need someone to stomp the brake for you but start buy checking if there is current at the globe. If there is no current there go back to the first loom, disconnect the plug and repeat the test on the brake light wires. No current, go back until the cables disappear into the main loom. If you find it's between the plugs and the lights you concentrate on just that part which could well be a broken wire. (Although it would have to be two given that they don't share a common positive lead).

If there is no current to the last plug you can get to then the problem is further back into the system. Fuses would seem likely from here but if you say they have checked all the fuses then it has to come back to a wiring fault, or maybe as Tony said something to do with the stereo or instrument panel, (although I thought that took out more than just the red lights). Either way I hope your Nissan dealer is smarter than mine I doubt mine could find a fault like that.

Thanks KP. Back to the problem. As both the red tail lites & red stop lites are using the same twin filiment globe, in a plastic lens assembley base which has a seperate earth wire, maybe the left and right rear red lites earth goes bask to a 'Y' then from there into just the one wire. Then all four filiments would be depending on that one earth return wire rendering both red tail lites and red stop lites in-operative, but not affecting anything else. Great theory but who knows. Will report back when I get my wheels back. Hey KraftyPg, this weekend, looks like you clean up the mess or just learn to live with it;-)

My brother goes up to Emerald mines to conduct training courses once or twice a year but thats about as close as you will get me to there

You could be on a the right track with the earth but I think that's where physically testing it with a multimeter yourself and not just hoping a Nissan tech went that far might prove to be the right thing to do.

Alternatively just hook them up to a live wire, and run a switch through the cabin that you can operate whenever you like. Will sure annoy the crap out of tailgaters

Yee Haaa! Lites work now.......

Emerald Nissan fixed it on Friday. No charge and no fuss. Seems it was just a loose connection but that is all the info I got. My guess is it was as we thought, the single earth wire before it branched out to the two sets of rear lites. Now the sad part. I understand these great guys at this Ford / Nissan dealership have as of Friday, lost Nissan. Nissan may regret this move as this town is just at a stage where a fuse has been lit. This year the fuse will trigger what can only amount to an explosion as the multi billion dollar Alpha coal fields develop. We can expect no less than ten years of exploding growth here on the Central Queensland Highlands with Emerald as the hub. (reason we shipped up here in the first place some 26yrs ago). Thousands of jobs will be available in the coal and supporting commercial sectors.. But hey! Back to Emerald Nissan. Looks like my next car will have to Ford as this is the place where we will buy. Any association with Mazda breathes quality anyway.

This happened to my old man! There is a pressure switch in your brake line that is the switch for your break lights to come on it took us a long time to find out what had happened.

This happened to me on the weekend. Was trying to fix the trailer lights (rusted) and obviously shorted something. The tail lights on the car stopped working, but the break lights continued to work. I checked all of the fuses in the fuse box in the cab (behind glove box) and the one in the fuse box on the drivers side in the engine bay. No luck ... all fuses ok.

As per the poster earlier in this thread, there is ANOTHER fuse box (not described in the manual) on the passenger side in the engine bay sitting next to the fire wall. It is a flat top black box which the lid un-clips. There are another dozen or so fuses of which one of those is the tail lights.

Cheers,