Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

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JPark
Posts: 44
Joined: Tue May 29, 2007 12:35 am
Location: Phoenix, AZ

Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by JPark »

My front turn signal quit blinking. It’s lit, so it doesn’t seem to be the bulb. Reading online it sounds like it could be the turn signal flasher but if that were the case wouldn’t all the blinkers stop working? Any other possible cause?
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jolt
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Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by jolt »

Need more details and information.
Caretaker

Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by Caretaker »

fuse
JPark
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Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by JPark »

jolt wrote:Need more details and information.
I’ll see if I can oblige. It’s the front right turn signal that fails to blink. Back right works fine. Front right is lit but doesn’t blink. When I turn on the right blinker, it blinks very fast (or rather, the back light blinks very fast).
RIP '06 Platinum Vibe--at 189k miles, you died too young
'09 Vibe GT--we're still getting acquainted
JPark
Posts: 44
Joined: Tue May 29, 2007 12:35 am
Location: Phoenix, AZ

Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by JPark »

Caretaker wrote:fuse
Which fuse?
RIP '06 Platinum Vibe--at 189k miles, you died too young
'09 Vibe GT--we're still getting acquainted
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joatmon
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Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by joatmon »

I've never touched an 09

Does the left side work ok?
Does the left side blink at a normal rate?
How do the emergency flashers behave?

In these cars, the turn signal flasher is sensitive to the electrical load on it, and will blink fast if one of the bulbs is bad, as a way to let you know about it. This sometimes is a problem for people who replace the regular bulbs with LEDs, which draw less current and can make a flasher go frantic. Yours blinking fast in the back would point to a bad front bulb, except you say it lights up fine. A free thing to try would be to swap the left and right turn signal bulbs and see if the problem stays on the right or follows the bulb.

I wouldn't expect a fuse to only affect the front right turn signal, but sometimes electrical things work on the principle of FM (f'in magic)
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JPark
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Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by JPark »

joatmon wrote:I've never touched an 09

Does the left side work ok?
Does the left side blink at a normal rate?
How do the emergency flashers behave?

In these cars, the turn signal flasher is sensitive to the electrical load on it, and will blink fast if one of the bulbs is bad, as a way to let you know about it. This sometimes is a problem for people who replace the regular bulbs with LEDs, which draw less current and can make a flasher go frantic. Yours blinking fast in the back would point to a bad front bulb, except you say it lights up fine. A free thing to try would be to swap the left and right turn signal bulbs and see if the problem stays on the right or follows the bulb.

I wouldn't expect a fuse to only affect the front right turn signal, but sometimes electrical things work on the principle of FM (f'in magic)
Left side is fine, though the brake light is out on the left. I assume that’s unrelated as it’s been out for a few weeks. I’ll try the bulb swap. Thanks!
RIP '06 Platinum Vibe--at 189k miles, you died too young
'09 Vibe GT--we're still getting acquainted
jolt
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Location: Twin Cities, Minnesota

Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by jolt »

Do all the lights work properly with the hazard flashers on? If not, try removing the right front bulb and then switch the turn signals on. Do the rear turn signal lights now flash at the same rate in both left and right sides?

If it does, the easy thing to try is to replace the bulb. This may or may not fix it at this point. If removing the bulb does not change the rate of flashing down to normal speed, and the rear lamp continues to flash at a high rate of speed, look in the bulb socket and at the base of the bulb for any signs of corrosion or damage. If you do not see anything unusual, I would suspect bad wiring in the right turn signal circuit. The front and rear turn signal lights are powered from the same circuit and get there power from the same source.

Does anything change if you have the headlights on and then turn the right turn signal on? If things then change with both systems on, check for bad grounding for that lamps wiring. Bad grounding can cause the power to back feed to a different circuit as it tries to find a place to ground. This can cause all kinds of weird things to happen. Easy things to find are when a circuit is either shorted out to ground or is fully open, as in a broken wire. The really hard electrical problems to find are the partially grounded or partially open wiring or connections. I would also recommend that if you have any LED bulbs in this lighting system for the turn signals, remove them and go back the the proper bulb for the car. At the very least, remove them for troubleshooting this problem as flaky LED bulbs can add to the weirdness factor in trying to diagnosis your problem.
JPark
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Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by JPark »

Thanks. I’ll run your tests tomorrow.
RIP '06 Platinum Vibe--at 189k miles, you died too young
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hogdoctor
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Re: Front turn signal lights up but doesn’t blink

Post by hogdoctor »

I would be looking for a short between the front running lamp filament and the turn signal filament, either internal to the bulb or something in the socket, connector, wiring...
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