Brake, lights, turn signals and other things FUBAR

Hi All,

I recently got a problem with my van. This article that I found online describes the problem to the T, although the proposed resolution is incorrect.

http://autorepair.about.com/library/faqs/bl281h.htm

Anyway, the patient is a 1995 E150 Cargo Van. V8 Automatic.

Driving along, all of the sudden, ABS light comes on. I come in to a parking lot, park the van and after some checking find that the brake lights arent working. Then discover that the thing will not shift out of park. I figured that there was a safety preventer that does not let it shift out of park without the brakes being applied.

I checked the brake light switch, the switch was OK, but it had no juice going to it. I figured a popped fuse... For the time being, I ran a hot wire right to the switch and got my brake lights and shifter to work. This way I limped home.

However, when driving I turned on the blinker and applied the brake at the same time which caused my live hot-wire to start burning and melting. I removed it (killing my brake lights altogether), the ABS light came on as before but because I was in Drive already, I was able to shift just OK. The tranny began to shift real finny - as if I was towing something heavy - the engine would rev much higher than usual before shifting and the shifts were very rough.

Bottom line, I suspect that somewhere in one place (a switch or relay of some sort) the blinkers, turn signals, the park lock-out switch and something having to do with the tranny shift points comes together. I cannot seem to find a wiring diagram for this van, but if I had one, I could propably figure this out.

A hunch in my gut says that its somehow tied in with the emergency light switch...

Well, I thought I would post my half-solution for now...

I thought that the fuse box under the hood was all that this car had and all of those were good. However, after digging in the driver foot well a little we found a box with a cover that had a bunch of fuses in it. #1 and #5 both 15A were fried. According to another article, those go into the "multipurpose light switch" which I think means the switch with the emergency light button on it. I have been having problems with that switch working sometimes and not others and it seems like break lights and all blinkers run through it. I think an intermitent problem in that switch caused one or both of the fuses to pop and the alien wiring in the system did not like being hot-wired via the brake light foot switch...

After replacing both fuses, everything works as normal.

There are some wiring diagrams for your vehicle on www.autozone.com - not a complete set, but better than nothing. Click on Repair Info and then select your vehicle, then click on View Repair Guide, then Chassis Electrical, and then Wiring Diagrams.

If you end up on the same page that I was on earlier, then the diagram at the bottom-right of Fig.26 (on the Wiring Diagrams page) looks very similar to what you have described - the brake light circuit is indeed routed via the Hazard switch, so that might be of some assistance if it does refer to your model, and I suspect that it might because the Hazard switch shown is fed from fuses #1 & #5, which you mentioned in your last post.