1943 Dodge Weapon Carrier New Brake/Tail/Turn/Hazard Lights

This was way more of an ordeal than it should have been. I ordered a cheap turn signal switch and an LED brake light package to install on the ol' beast. Brake lights and turn signals would be a welcome addition that the truck currently doesn't have. Here's the first turn signal switch I bought from Amazon. Notice it says LED right in the title.

Below is the LED light set I bought from Amazon.

Before running wiring on the truck, and mounting lights and turn signal switch, I figured I should hook everything up and see if it actually works, so I did just that. Just the running lights and brake lights came on. No flashy flashy with the signals. Numerous hours of fiddling, tearing apart the turn signal switch, and researching online didn't get me anywhere, so I thought maybe the turn signal flasher was the type that only worked on incandescent bulbs, so I scheduled a return of the turn signal switch and bought another one (shown below) that came with a different style flasher unit.

Once that switch came, I hooked everything back up and basically had the same issues as before. No flashing. Hmm, what's wrong here? I pulled this second switch apart and didn't find anything out of the ordinary (see two photos below), other than a little part fell off that should have been crimped in, and the indicator light appeared to be blown. I still had the first switch in the house so I swapped the two turn signal switches, so Amazon would get back a non-LED flasher plus a non-working turn signal switch.

I didn't want to order yet a third turn signal switch so I decided to order yet another type of LED flasher. They happened to come in a box of four for twelve bucks.

Then I did more research online and came up with a possible wiring solution. I wired the second LED flasher using the online wiring diagram and lights started flashing. I then thought that the first flasher unit might work using the new wiring method but it still didn't. There was still a lot of stuff going wrong but at least I was making headway and I figured out that the wiring diagram on the switch box for the flasher unit was completely wrong. I was also able to return the four replacement flashers.

Another problem I finally realized was that the indicator bulb in the turn signal switch was incompatible with the LED flasher unit, so I won't have an indicator in the cab. Not sure what to do about that, but I'll just keep moving forward with the project. I'd spent way too much time trying to figure out the indicator.

I found a couple holes to bolt the brake lights into on the back of the truck and ran wires to the turn signal switch I mounted on the steering column. Several days prior I had traced a lot of the wiring on the truck (a not-so-minor chore of its own) and found where I could pull 12v power and tail light power from, so I got a lot of wiring done. The below video shows the hazard lights going, then I switch to left and right turn signals. That was a big milestone.

The below photo shows the tail lights on. The truck also has an original tail light on the left side under the bed (yes, it came with just one) that is also on.

This next photo shows the hazards on.

The light kit came with a couple of side marker lights that I am using for the front turn signals. I had to make brackets and then mounted the lights under the headlights. The hazards/signals are off here.

The hazards are on in this photo.

These final two photos just show the truck's new lights.

I'll explain a bit about the wiring. The flasher unit has three terminals. The (incorrect) wiring diagram on the turn signal's box said the left terminal is fused 12v power, the center terminal is the signal indicator wire (the bulb inside the turn signal switch that lights up when something is flashing), and the right terminal is the "load". The correct way to wire the flasher unit is to run fused power to the left terminal (the one right thing the box said), the center terminal is the "load", and the right terminal is ground. Apparently a three-wire flasher unit for LEDs doesn't have a terminal for powering an indicator bulb. Too bad. Maybe I'll figure some way to get indicators...

One final note, the function of the headlight switch on the truck was another little headache that added to the frustration. It has four positions, (1) Off, (2) Blackout Lights Only, (3) Service Lights including Brake Light, and (4) Brake Light Only. That's not confusing at all...