vk - bad earth???

[308commodore]

hey guy's, my mate has a vk commodore with a couple of electrical issues. when he put's the headlights on he has no tail lights, or any dash lights. but when he puts his foot on the brakes hard, the dash lights come on as well as the tail lights. we know the alternator is playing up but will be replaced this weekend. also, this might be a stupid question but what is e.s.t? we noticed the e.s.t light came on the dash. all help would be greatly appreciated...

[immortality]

[immortality]

E (electronic) S (i forgot) T (timing), if it comes on when your driving it means there is a fault and it's gone into limp home mode. it does sound like he's got a bad earth somewhere. when your braking it's earthing through the brake light circuit

[Cane_It]

Check the earth in the tail light loom, the black earth wire pin in that terminal sometimes pushes out from the plug giving you a bad earth, I broke into that wire both before and after the harness and ran two auxilliary earth wires to a bolt on the metal where the tail lights are, never had a drama after that.

What you described sounds exactly like the problem my solution outlined above fixed.

[vee ka]

all commodore models VP and below are notorious for bad earths, especially when it comes to tail lights!!

he'll have to check all the earths and may even have to re-earth in a few spots like the guy said above.

i have changed, in my VK and previuos VL, all the tail light plugs ( globe holders ) for new ones, this fixed my problem straight away but is a little different to your mates.

earth problem is common problem

[308commodore]

just want to say thankyou to the guy's who responded. we have fixed the earth problem. after all the mucking around with regrounding earth wires. we changed fuses, bulbs and checked the fusebox. but all is good and a big thumbs up to you guy's...
CHEERS...