rear turn signals do not work - help please!!

My rear (both) turn signals do not work. Both front signals work properly. The emerg. flasher works properly at all four corners. The tail and brake lights work properly. I have the tail light assemblies wired as per instructions in the manual (rev 2d). I have cut the white and yellow wires at the toggle switch connector which is not used. I have a blinking signal at the proper pin on the steering column connector for right and left rear turn signal (white and yellow) as expected. I have a blinking signal at the unused yellow and white wires at the end of the rear harness assembly.
I spoke to Dan at FFR and he verified everything seems normal. He told me that all four corners have to be connected to get proper resistance to make the flashers work so I hooked up at 1157 test bulb into the front left circuit. It blinks like normal but the rear does not. He suggests that I call Ididit and see how this is supposed to work because the turn signal is supposed to travel down the purple wire to the rear brake light when signaling. Somehow, the yellow turn signal output gets turned purple and makes for blinking lights. He also thinks I should ohm out the rear harness to see if I can find where the yellow wire turns purple.
This isn't my first rodeo and I know wires don't change color in the middle of the harness. I also know the three wire lights are very common in our hotrod world so this is not rocket science. What could I possibly have done to make this not work?
I have read and reread every post I can find and nothing similar is listed regarding this problem. I must have something connected wrong, missing, or I am just plain out of it today. Any help is greatly appreciated.
Tom
916 812-5441

If I remember correctly, the purple wire comes off the brake light switch and should feed the turn signal connector. There the turn signal switch decides whether the brake lights (individually) are solid on or blinking. Don't remember if the switch converts the purple to white and/or yellow, but it makes sense. Seems to me that you have bypassed the turn signal switch when going to the brake lights.

I recommend that you invest in a tone tracker. A tone tracker comes with two parts. One is the transmitter and the other is the tracker. You connect one lead to the wire you are tracing and the other to ground. Then the wire you are tracking acts as an antenna and the tracker probe tells you where the wire goes. It will find hidden in line fusses that have blown, and is not fooled by wire harness rats nests.

I had a problem with the connector that connects the rear harness to the fuse block. When the pin in the connector was crimped the copper wire was not connected to the metal pin. I traced the wire from the fuse box to the rear harness and there was no connectivity. I had to take the pin out and solder the wire to it. In the ididit box you should have a schematic diagram. I hope this helps. Good luck

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Originally Posted by britpit

If I remember correctly, the purple wire comes off the brake light switch and should feed the turn signal connector. There the turn signal switch decides whether the brake lights (individually) are solid on or blinking. Don't remember if the switch converts the purple to white and/or yellow, but it makes sense. Seems to me that you have bypassed the turn signal switch when going to the brake lights.

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Good suggestion but it did not resolve the problem. The brake light switch receives +12 (orange wire) from the fuse box. The +12 sits there until you touch the brake pedal at which time the +12 goes to the Ididit column on the purple wire and connects to the Ididit white wire as brake light feed. At the same time, the purple wire from the brake switch goes to the rear harness as "brake lights" (purple wire). That gives you your rear brake lights only. When you turn on the left side blinker, the fuse panel supplies +12 to the column via the grey wire labeled turn flasher fd. that grey wire goes into the column on pin L and connects to Ididit purple wire which is called turn signal feed. That goes to the turn signal switch where it is passed through and out as left turn signal on the yellow and lt. blue Ididit wires going to our green and yellow wires which are labeled left turn signal front and rear. Same process for right except that the colors change. The confusion lies in the fact that the brake light feed going to the column on the purple wire is not +12 volts because you are not pressing the pedal. the flashing signal has to come from the grey wire called flasher feed and somehow get applied to the purple wire to flash the signals. I don't understand how the purple wire can give you either left or right signals when it is jumped together at the front end of the rear harness connector. I think the Ididit outputs of yellow, white, lt. blue and dk. blue should be feeding the turn signals and I don't have a clue as to what purpose the purple wire serves since the yellow and white wires do function properly as brake lights.

If I connect the black wires to the white tail light wires on both sides (ground), tan wires to the black tail light wire (tail lights), and the yellow to left red wire and white to right red wire everything seems to work well with one exception. Wired that way, the front turn signals flash regardless of which way the switch is thrown. I am quitting for the night and will investigate the rest of the story tomorrow. Thanks to everyone for their help.. I will send another update tomorrow.

This may sound silly but is the engine running during your test. I also had induction voltage from the coil pack interfering with the signals.

OK, when you relate things by memory you don't always get it correctly.

The purple wire from the brake light switch goes to the white wire on the column harness and does not go any further. If you take it back to the brake lights, you will have brake lights and no turn signals. The white and yellow wires of the chassis harness connect to the green and yellow wires (respectively) of the column harness. The turn signal switch will tell then them whether they will be brake light(s) and no turn signals, or one brake light and one turn signal, or one turn signal and no brake light. You've already got the front figured out.

Regards,
Wayne P

Thanks Wayne,
The problem is fixed after I separated the indicator wires under the dash that were shorted. Now everything works as advertised. I was told early on to disregard the wiring diagram in the book and from Ron Francis and to use the purple wire for brake lights. The yellow and white were not used. Once I remembered that I was dealing with FFR, I hooked the lights up like they were labeled and voila, they worked. The purple wire just isn't used in the rear harness, period. Thanks for your help. You and the other responders pushed me in the right direction and we got it fixed. Now, all we need ifs for FFR to get their act together and start telling people that correct information when they ask about these tail lights. The drawings are already in digital format online and any twelve year old girl could fix them in minutes, Ron Francis could make the necessary changes so that the damn harness fits right and is appropriate to the '33 in another few minutes . These are production environments that excel at replicating things like harnesses aver and over. FFR needs to make the changes to both the harnesses and to the drawings/instructions now so future buyers do not have to struggle like I have on this simple task. STEP UP AND GET IT DONE GUYS.