Brake Light/Turn Signal problem - need the answer please

05/24/04
I have searched this Suburban forum as well as the Yukon, the Tahoe, the Escalade, and the Trailblazer forums. It seems that a lot of us have been experiencing this same problem but no one has come back and given us the definite procedure to fix it. I promise that I will return and give specifics of how I fixed mine.

Here's the problem: The brake lights don't light up when the brakes are applied - but the turn signals do. That's right, the turn signals act like they are the brake lights. The turn signals do not work at all. From the driver's seat all I see is that when I apply the brakes both arrows light up on the dash. When I use the turn signal it flashes very fast. The Sub was fine last night and gave no indication of a problem until this morning. It has rained a TON here in the past week and I am sure that with the flooded roads something had to have gotten wet. I read all of the above forums and have tried a few things that were mentioned - (ground wires checked out back and connections were tightened, bulbs checked) Nothing fixed it. I followed the wire looms over to behind the passenger rear wheel where they all come together and hook into a board of some type on the inside of the 1/4 panel. I fiddled with each connector and cleaned out some road crud and it fixed the problem - for 10 miles only. Now I'm back to the beginning of this mess. I will be heading to the dealer in a few minutes to see if they know of a solution. Has anyone got the answer I need?

Watching my rear view mirror,
Mark

I see that there has been no reply so I take it that either no one has figured this out or no one has returned to help the rest of us.

Here is what I have done:

I visited the dealer to no avail. No one had heard of it or knew of any way to fix the problem. I searched the microfiche in the parts department with the previous posts in mind following each tail light wiring harness throughout the vehicle. I figured that the best place to start would be the distribution panel. This panel is located behind the rear passenger tire attached to the inside of the quarter panel. It has 4 connectors on it which come from all the lights in the back. Mine was caked with road dirt. I removed it by loostening the 10mm bolt and dropping it down into my hand. I removed each connector (one at a time of course) and cleaning the whole thing. I put it all back together and re-installed the panel. My problem went away and has not returned in 2 days. I'll reply again in a few days to update you all if this finally fixed it.

AUGH!!! it is happening to someone else. I thought I was going crazy. I just logged on & am headed back outside to try your suggestion.
Thank you

Three days, many miles, rainy days.... Still going strong. I love this Suburban but what a dumb idea to put this panel right behind a tire with no protection! I've got 20's on it with very wide tires, so I know I am a bit to blame but c'mon GM!

i also have had the same problem twice but on my 97 burban it has trailor lights on the back and they shorted out from the rain. if you have trailor lights or if it happens again i would try that?

Had the exact same problem with my 97 burban, no one could tell me what was going on... eventually the problem got worse burned out blinkers (found out later from master elec. that long term amp increase will burn out bulbs and NOT fuses) Problem turned out to be the pigtail on my truck yet my trailer lights still worked. Look for exposed wires on the trailer hook up (pigtail) if you don't see any could just be two hairline crack course I didn't find that till I got ticked off enough to just cut the pigtail off made me feel better as well. good luck

Just a quick thought. Did you check/replace either the turn signal or the flasher relay. On some vehicles, when you have the flashers on and hit the brakes, the lights stop flashing and just stay on. Sounds somewhat similiar to your symptoms. Like I said...just a thought.

When I started this thread I said that I'd keep everyone posted on my solution and progress. So here is an update: It's been over a month now and it still shows no signs of brake light failure. Read the first couple of posts of mine on here and you will see what I did to fix my problem. I never had any blown fuses or burned out bulbs, no bad relays or wire harnesses. I cleaned out that distribution block behind the rear tire and I've put over 1000 miles on it in rain and bad weather and still no problem. I've now installed a factory hitch and wiring and it works perfect as well. I'll check back now and then and give more updates should something happen.

Chances are that if you're reading this then you are having this problem. Go ahead and try this on yours but in any case come back and tell us if it worked or what you had to do to fix yours. We're counting on you!

I have a 1999 chevy burban and for some reason I've having this problem the my one brake on the passanger side won't light up when you press the brake but the other side will. And also when I apply the turning signal on the passanger side it blinks really fast and you can see the front singal flashing fast but the back does not flash at all. So for some reason the brake and signal lights don't work at all on the back passanger side. But the running lights do go figure if any one could help me i would really appreciate it.