XJEmp

I know I know. Literally thousands of posts on this issue. I've been working on this on and off for the last year.

Long story short:
I've had my 1992 2 door XJ since 2005, it used to be my dedicated trail runner but I let it sit at a farm for a few years while I focused on my career. It was inhabited by multiple families of field mice in that time, jesus it was a disaster.
I had to tear out the dash, the blower motor and vent ducting and all of the interior to clean out the dead mice and all the nests. They were even inside the doors... So right there you're probably thinking short circuit.. well me too.

I started with the fuses, all good there. Then to the wiring harness front side of the firewall, for clarity I've only touched the wiring north of the connector that plugs into the headlight harness. South of that connector the wiring goes into a box mounted on the inside of the LF engine compartment wall.. Is that the ECU? Then the wiring goes to the firewall and to the fuse panel. Anyways.. peeling back the factory electrical tape job on the headlight harness I found that the wires were getting so hot that they had shed their insulation and were short circuiting like mad. I was surprised that I even had headlights or a healthy fuse panel for that matter. A visit to the local junkyard provided a pristine headlight wiring harness. I pulled the tape off that one, spliced in, sealed and insulated the headlight, running light and signal connectors and wrapped it with some quality electrical tape. I thought I had found the problem, except, I didn't.

The bulbs all work, hazards work, headlights work--lows and highs, running lights work but turn signals do not. No light anywhere, no sound from the flashers, nothing. I replaced both the flasher units on the fuse panel and just yesterday tore the steering column apart and replaced the turn signal switch. So now, in my mind, I've narrowed it down to either the wiring from the signal switch to the fuse panel and the wiring from the fuse panel to the headlight harness. Which is a pain because man those bits of harness look like a nightmare to work on and diagnose. I'm realizing that in my rush to write this post I didn't plug in my gauge cluster before testing.. maybe that's the cause. I'm going to go do that right after submitting.

I'm hoping you XJ experts out there can give me some insight. I know this isn't as complicated as it is to me right now, but I'm really not an electrician by trade. I'm hoping that the circuit is incomplete somewhere and it's just a matter of fixing one wire's connector but that's just hopeful thinking.
Give me strength experts, I'm out of ideas.

Edit: Nope, plugging in the gauge cluster did nothing. But something I noticed that I'm not sure about: When activating the emergency flashers, the timing is off. It clicks like, one-onethousand, one-onethousand, one-onethousand, one-one, one-one, one-one, one-onethousand, one-onethousand, one-onethousand.. whaat wheres the rip my hair out emoji :rip:

Edit2: Spent the last few hours researching wire diagrams and chasing voltage, next I'm going to test all the same circuits for changes in impedance. Nuetral/Left/Right corresponds to the position of the turn signal switch. Anything look odd to you guys? I'm trying my best to do my due diligence, I really need help badly.

Additionally, can anyone tell me if this wiring diagram is relevant for a 92 XJ?
http://oljeep.com/gw/elec/90_numeric...8W_Page-18.jpg

cruiser54

Aren't there 2 flasher units?

One for the hazards and one for the turn signals

robertj

My first thought as well.

JSJJ388

There are.

Batman33165

Is this any help?

The 2 round areas on each corner would be where the flashers go...

XJEmp

I made a mistake in the title (meant hazards not flashers) and it seems to be confusing everyone. Can I get a mod to change that for me?
There are two flashers and as I've already said, both of them have been replaced. And no unfortunately I already have a great view of my fuse panel with no dash in my rig.

Stayed in the shop until 1am recording impedance of the circuits , I'll just rewrite everything in one place, impedance to the thousandth is in parenthesis and bold. Not sure what the negative means but I wrote it down anyways.
Once again written left to right as the positions of the turn signal switch, NuetralVoltage(Ohms)/LeftVoltage(Ohms)/RightVoltage(Ohms). I'm pretty confident in my resistance readings, it took a while to find a solid ground but once I did the readings were very stable.

IGNITION OFF -- IGNITION ON
Brake Switch - X
Right Rear - 0(.002)/0(.002)/0(.002) -- 0(-.010)/0(-.010)/0(-.003)
Left Rear - 0(.002)/0(.002)/0(.002) -- 0(-.010)/0(-.002)/0(-.009)
Turn Flasher - 0.1(1)/0(.003)/0(.002) -- 12(1)/0(-.001)/0(-.001)
Hazard Flasher - 12(1)/12(1)/12(1) -- 12(1)/12(1)/12(1)
Right Front - 0(.005)/0(.005)/0(.004) -- 0(-.005)/0(-.005)/0(-.002)
Left Front - 0(.003)/0(.002)/0(.003) -- 0(-.007)/0(-.002)/0(-.006)
Horn - 12/12/12 -- 12/12/12
Key Buzzer - 12/12/12 -- 12/12/12
Key Buzzer - 0/0/0 -- 0/0/0

Does this help to decipher where the issue is?
I find it strange that the difference in resistance is so small in the Right Front circuit (3 thousandths of an ohm) compared to the Left Front (5 thousandths) especially when the wiring is longer to the Right Front bulb. I'll be busy tearing my wiring harness apart while I wait for your replies. Thanks.

Edit: Now that I'm looking at this information again, shouldn't the switch circuits LF, LR, RF, and RR read 1ohms when the switch is not engaged to it's corresponding position?

XJEmp

200 people viewed and nobody has an idea, huh? Guess I'm on my own.

outersketcher

I still think you have a ground somewhere. Tho I am no sparky by a looong shot.

Isn't the blinker system a full system? as apposed to front half with its own blinker and back half with IT'S own blinker?

So, a kinked or rusty ground on one of your rear tailights could be effecting everything.

I didn't read anywhere that you checked all the mechanical connections to all the bulbs? scraped them clean.. made sure the connections were solid, and that the grounds are all solidly bolted to clean, non rusty metal? I would do that first before doing anything else.

A rusty ground can cause intermittent breakage in the system. (I know from experience, not scientific knowledge) Don't the blinkers require a certain amount of amps to trip them? So if you have weak flow of power.. they just wont trip. right?.. I wish i could be of more help then this. All I know is that several times in the past. Whenever I had blinker lights fail on me.. it was ALWAYS in the end.. bad grounds.

Just the ignorant thoughts from a guy who has suffered through bad blinkers before...

J_Irish85

ground issue is a good possibility. Or your out of blinker fluid

XJEmp

outersketcher

yah.. I've gone through this with several old VWs... an '84 Honda Civic, my
95 XJ, and a '01 Durango. In every...single...case. It turned out to be a bad ground. Which is wonderful. Because that's an easy fix. I hope it turns out to be the same for you. Good luck man.

cruiser54

Here:

craigjacob1

I assume you checked that your turn signal switch is working?

XJEmp

Either you didn't read the post or you mean what I think you mean.
I'm assuming that it is, it's brand new and I already took the rental tools back. I will flip 2000 tables if it ends up being a faulty part. haha let's just forget about that for right now.

craigjacob1

Sort of a shot in the dark, but you could try flipping on your high beams.
They are on different wires, but if they don't come on there's a good chance the problem is in that area.