62 Bel Air wiring problems (Tail lights or Head light swtich)

Just like the title says, I am having issues with my wiring that goes into my head light switch. The head light switch is getting hot and causing puffs of smoke. Now I have swapped out the head light switch and continue to have the same issue. Here is what has been done recently.. BTW I have only owned this car for about 3 weeks so I have no idea what used to work and what didnt...
1 installed a new 3 wire GM Alt.. The car had one in it but it was bad
2 Installed a new battery
3 the head lights were very dim so I re grounded the head lights and place and 8GA body ground wire going from the battery to the core support
After I grounded the head lights is when I noticed the puff of smoke from under the dash, reached up and felt the head light switch and it was burning hot. I did not notice it at the time but it popped the tail light fuse. My immediate thought was that the brake light switch was shorting out so I replaced it.
Moving forward I noticed the tail light fuse was blown so I replaced it. Now as long as the tail lights are not on the switch does not get hot so that eliminates the brake lights from being the issue. I noticed my blinker switch just flops around and does not engage... Could that be the issue?? Is there something else that I am missing?? Also the amperage I tested off the cig lighter appears to be all over the map ranging from 1V to 13.5V


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switch may not be used to all those amps running thru it, the old alt didn't produce that much juice. You might think about putting in relays to control the headlights...... useing the existing switch to turn on the relays instead of the lights.... pretty easy to do.

is it hot all the time or when you put the lights on? the turn signal might very well have somthing to do with it. if you just turn on the parking lights does it get hot then? the body of the switch is a resistor for your dash lights the problem could be there too.

so first check your tail light wiring and sockets for shorts then check the turn signal switch to see if anything is shorted in the column

by itself having a higher amp altenator will not cause the problem it only puts out what is being called for by the various circuits

it sounds to me like you have a short somewhere.

Old system was always trying to keep up with the demand, that's why my lights grew dim, but there wasn't enough output from the alt to melt stuff etc..... I solved the dim,flickering lights issue by putting in a new alt..... my light switch got hot and melted stuff, I replaced the light sw thinking it was the problem...... new one got hot...... from the info I got from this board, I installed light relays.... no more hot sw or funny smells comin from that area

May not be an issue ..... but it fixed my problems

Tail lights and stop lights are two different circuits. Stop lights run through the turn signal switch. If the tail lights are blowing fuses the problem is in that circuit. Pull one tail light bulb (L) turn on the lights, see if the fuse goes south. Replace the (L) remove the (R) if that blows the fuse also both sides have a short. If only one side causes the fuse to blow, start at that light and start tracing the wire, also look in the socket.
Tail light short would cause the head light switch to get hot, 63s had a head light switch that would handle the power just fine and a new alternator as stated above only puts out what it is asked for and will not cause the switch to get hot/smoke.
Relays are only used when head lights are upgraded and are hungry for more power, relays are also used when someone wants to change out the head light switch and use a smaller switch that cannot handle the power requirements of the load a head light system needs. Think toggle switch here, which brings up the real reason relays are used with a head light up grade ..... it is all about the load thorough the switch, nothing more.

One other item to mention, that switch has a rheostat that when turned clockwise will increase the brightness of the dash lights, do not quote me and the next statement cause I cannot remember for sure but it may even turn on the dome light.

Good luck it does not sounds like it is to big of a mystery you have on your hands.

Thank you for all the helpful advice guys. I today I disconnected the turn signal plug from the harness but the switch still heated up. I didnt have another person here to help me see if the brake lights were working or not. I do know that if you press the brakes and do not turn the head lights on the switch will not heat up. I also noticed that my tail lights are not coming on at all now for some reason so I have to chase that beast down. The tail wiring has been replaced by the previous owner and I noticed they have a ground wire wrapped around the inside of the socket which I assume they are using to ground out the tail light.. Makes no sense to me really because I assumed the tail lights were grounded through a wire in the back. I dont know but I do know it is very frustrating to not be able to drive it up to local cruise ins or drive it at night at all. Thanks again for all the help guys, this site by far has been the only one to offer any advice whats so ever.. Beings this is my first older car I seek out all the advice I can get

I believe the taillights are powered with a black wire up to at least 1965

The wires in the back should be

Tan----gas gage
Black---taillights
Pink----left turn and stop
purple--right turn and stop
Lt Green--back-up

The issue is in the rear or intermediate wiring harness

Somewhere in the trunk, near the left wheel well is a connector for the for the taillight harness.
Unplug that connector, replace the taillight fuse, and turn on the lights.
If the headlight switch does not get hot, you will find some wiring issues in the back of the car somewhere. Keep in mind, the black wire on this car is NOT ground.

If the headlight switch still gets hot, and the fuse pops, the issue is in the intermediate harness.
Remove the driver side front kick panel and you will see a harness that runs from the floor up to a 8wire connector up under the dash.
Unplug this connector and turn on the headlights-----if the switch does not overheat and blow a fuse----the issue is in that harness.

In the event that this car has the same colors as my 59 did, you may have 2 black wires in that connector----one is hot all the time and fed from the battery and the other wire is for the taillights. The white wire in this harness is strictly for the dome light ground----do not tap into this wire for anything.

It is possible that the extra two wires in that connector may be orange and white----orange is always hot----white is dome light ground.

If by chance---and I think not---GM changed to a more universal color code by 1962

Brown-----taillights
yellow-----left turn and stop
Dk Green--Rt turn and stop
Tan-------Gas gage
Lt Green--backup lamps

All the lamps should be grounded thru the body so there will be no ground wires for any of them.

Turn signals are in no way related to the taillights or the headlight switch.
Disconnecting the turn switch will only disable the turn signals and brake lights.
The turns are fed by a different circuit altogether, not related to the taillights.

awesome thank you for the advice. The only reason I disconnected the turn is because the switch was just flopping around so I figured it left an open circuit. So am I correct in thinking that the black should be split to provide power to both lights? Right now they have a pink and a black tapped into to provide power to each light. pink going to one and black going to the other there is a violet wire back there that has no power coming to it at the current moment. Should both tails be tapped off of the black? My wires are identical to the first one you listed above. I have a wiring diagram but it is a cluster F back there lol

I use relays for my headlights, and found that for about $30 lmctruck.com had a reasonably priced relay kit that gave me all the parts. I could have made my own, but it wouldn't have been much cheaper. The only issue I found with the kit was that all wire bundles were wrapped in a bright yellow jacket. I put black flexible tubing around it because the yellow looked so out of place in my engine compartment.

I ran a 10 gauge wire with fusible link from my battery + to the relay kit, and an 8 gauge wire with fusible link from the battery + over to the BAT terminal on my 12si. From there its a very short path to the headlights, and there seems to be minimal voltage drip. My headlight switch now has only the very low amps for the relay activation going through it.

Bruce

And that's the REAL reason I put in the relays, load across the light switch.......

I believe on the BelAir, there are only two taillamps-----the inners are backups ??

the black wire should go to the taillights on both sides of the car and also to the license lamp.

You should be using a dual filament bulb on the outers that serve as tail and Brake/Signal lighting.

So--when hooking this up, the black wire needs to be hooked to the dim portion of the 1157 bulb-------the bright side is for turn/brake.

the pink and purple wires will have no power to them at all if the turn switch is disconnected----this means no brake lights either.

So--hook up the turn switch----step on the brake----and you should get 12 volts to the pink and purple wires-----pink on the left bright side of the bulb, purple on the right side.

If you have no brake lights after connecting the turn signal switch.
Check the brake switch near the brake pedal.
with the brake not applied there should be 12 volts on one side of the connector---nothing on the other side
Depress the pedal and you should get 12 volts on both sides of the switch
I cannot recall the wire colors for the brake switch off the top of my pointed little head.

If all this checks out okay, then a problem will be existing in the turn switch itself. Common.
All this stuff is available new from aftermarket so no need to really sweat this out.

But---you really need to locate that short in the rear harness before you go much further.

Thank you everyone for the help. I think I am going to wind up just rewiring the whole car. I find this easier then trying to chase down a demon plus it will resolve any future problems. At some point I am going to swap to a 350 so I think it will just make it easier when I do swap

You mentioned some sort of ground wrapped in side the socket? I would get ride of that right away, you are correct in your thinking that the ground is the outside of the tail light assembly. It is quite possible it is shorting there, that is close and tight when you put the bulb in. The tail light should have two wires, one brake and one tail light, ground is the assembly mounted to the car.

I will tell you a trick I use to see if my brake lights are working, simply put something up about a foot away from the rear, plywood. Step on the brake you will see the light, or roll the car back close to the garage door, brake lights are bright. Or take a 2 x 4 and lodge it in from the front of the seat to the peddle, so that it holds the peddle depressed.

Just a thought, if the lights are the only thing messed up, I think I would just work out the problems and not consider a complete rewire, not necessary. You have 4 basic circuits. Look around and see what has been worked or hacked, focus there you very well could solve multiple problem just cleaning that up.

1 low & high beams
2 parking and tail lights
3 turn signal
4 brake

Great advice!! Thanks again! I will try to work through those areas then. The only reason why a harness came into question is because I dont want to risk a fire. They also jimmied up the ignition.. They wired the coil to a switch along with a hot on the other side and some black wire that leads from the voltage regulator. The starter is connected to a starter button.. It just seems like a hacked up mess. I enjoy doing wiring projects but looking at this car has me concerned. I have tried to pull the dash out to look behind it but I started pulling it and noticed something was keeping it from coming out so I gave up and pushed it back in.. It was hot and I didnt feel like fighting with it at that point in time LOL