96 XL. The taillights have two bulbs, one above and one below. The top one illuminates for every function I can think of (like braking, turn signals, etc) and I can never get the bottom bulb to illuminate for either taillight. What function does it serve?

 

Are you talking about the reverse lights?

 

oh...... I don't know....

Maybe a reverse light like every other other vehicle? Yeah.

 

the tail lamp is quite simple and i hate it for it.

The reverse light is the key as others mentioned.

You have a fuse box, i suggest checking every fuse under the hood and the one by your left knee while behind the wheel.

also confirm your CHMSL works. thats the 3rd brake light on the cab

heres a 96 xl S=stop, C=cargo, D=door T,T,S= Turn, tail, stop R=reverse L = license plate lamp Technically, the TTS is also a Sidemarker, so maybe TTSS. It functions as the rear red side marker when viewed from the side of the truck.

 

Why do you hate the tail light? The simplicity is what makes it great and replacement lamps are inexpensive.

 

Tail lamps should never have one bulb do a safety feature, a SAFER-TY feature, and a non immediate safety rear facing intention lamp like a turn signal.(Turn, tail, stop functions in one bulb)
The color of the non safety feature should be AMBER. The tail lamp and stop CAN be the same bulb.. but really each side should always have two for either dedicated /tail/stop on one and either combo on both or just stop on the other.

The housing should by that nature have 4 bulbs in it with one dedicated to the turning feature, 1 reverse, 1-2 stop.turn.

You know how many f150s I see of this gen driivng with burnt tails ? Ive seen both with thankfully the CHMSL working in 2 scenarios. People are dumb, the extra bulbs isnt hard to incorporate and is done by most in some way these days + leds are used where the burn out isnt really a problem quite like before but they dont usually have bulbs to replace like old kinds.


The GMT800 of gm in the late 90s actually did this OK in my opinion. idk if the top red was 2 or just 1, but the amber and reverse were good.

I didnt mean anything about the general size or quality, its fine. I have this now:


I still have incandescent brake/turn/tail because I have e4OD and I didnt want to do resistor things yet.

I want to convert the reverse into a amber turn and decouple that from the red bulb and place the reverse in the bumper or something and make the resistor/LED switch for the tail at that time. im also thinking of different housings. these ones arent bad but they arent doing it for me. although illegal I have seen clear housings which i think would be cool af

 

This is my car but the tail lamp has 4 turns, 4 stops, 4 tail bulbs on the rear. The deck lid half are not legally required, they could be burnt out. the permanently mounted body side half are required. the reverse, sadly, is the top 2 of hte center 4 pods near the license plate that are unlit here. the decision to make 2 fake was dumb as hell but they are fine generally. the license plate is well illuminated with 2 thats normal. The car as you can tell has no side visible red, so ...
it has a side marker on the rear quarter on each side

As seen here the side marker on the back mounted low, the amber turns are clear when not lit (safer than red even red bulb behind clear)

I have a thing against the forward mounted turns.... lol

Mine were junk and ugly which is how we ended up with clear with amber bulbs. Id also like to install switchbacks in the center of the truck amber ones(the turn itself not the park lamp on the corner but also not the 194 sidemarker) That would be like a DRL with the park lamps on and look a little modern
as one may tell i take my lighting far

 

The 1990's GM truck tail light required a circuit board so it is no longer a simple lamp assembly. There are hundreds of new cars that have their tail lights done where the one bulb is tail, brake and signal, so it isn't just older stuff.

I have seen these trucks in the UK and Australia that had the reverse turned into a turn signal. All you need is an amber bulb and to figure out how to rewire it. Then the truck will not have reverse lights though, and I would rather have those than amber signals.

The reason you probably see a lot of older trucks like these with burnt tail lights is because people need to replace the bulbs or the sockets etc and is usually an easy repair. Many of these trucks are neglected etc or just worn and need some work. Also, the burnt out third brake light is a known problem because the socket melts as well as the light housing.

If you want bright safe brake lights, ditch those aftermarket altezza tail lights and just run some bright LEDs with stock lamps.

At least one brake light of the 3 needs to remain incandescent or have a resistor for the electronically controlled OD transmissions to be happy and for torque convertor lockup.

The clear lamp assemblies will get you pulled over. They do not meet federal safety standards.

As for LED switchbacks in the parking lights that is not completely legal either. Parking lights should be amber, but you can put bright LEDs which is what I did.

 

Ruff crowd, welcome to

 

I do prefer separate turn signals. They're just better. But the tail lights on these aren't that bad, especially if the third brake light works. Altezza-style lights didn't even look good on the Altezza.

In OP's defense, the 1156 reverse lights are dim enough that I can understand how you'd not know they were back there. We all start somewhere.

 

I am fine when it comes to the housings, I usually drive with lights on so they are lit, plus this is rural wisconsin they dont care about anything except loud exhaust and speeding which is a shame because there are a lot of truly.. problematic things that go by uncared about

anyway, I mentioned I would be augmenting new reverse lights.

also the tail light thing im kinda stuck with them until the future because the original tail lamps were.. well one had a crack and was taking water, they were brittle, the socket that holds the bulb on the back also broke partially on one, I threw them many years ago. I do think i may go back to that style but do my mentioned plan

Im not saying that ford did anything horrendous, im saying I think lighting should be more safety-first and that extends back in time, as in trucks since the beginnning of trucks till the 90s really had bare bones i get that.
I know newer vehicles do that stuff too, no mercy for them either lol.

the parking lamp thing, with drl, as long as the side facing side marker and the corner park lamp which is visible to the front and side of the truck are amber, the turn signal bulb(my mistake i should have been specific) could have the switch back and legally operate in my housing because it would not mean there would be no park lamp when not turning.

I actually didnt even have a corner park lamp on pass side till late summer since the beginning of using the truck years ago, mouse chewed the bulb connector off. I spliced in something and made it work. it looks ghetto as hell on the back, Lol.

this is an older photo you can see the corner lamp is not working on the pass side barely I took the photo at a nice looking angle lol. Anyway, it all works now. I also had to fix license plate lights


at the moment I use incandescent for the stop lamps. I was gonna replace both here because Those bulbs were handled by my skin and i never wiped them and they have been in use for a long time(before I got the truck) and I want to be ahead of a burn out

 

the only thing also technically not kosher about the headlamps assembly wise is the sidemarker is not very reflective amber without a bulb in it or lit(with the LED in it, it does a TINY bit but not enough for the law to be sure) but the bottom clear part isnt illegal, those actually were possible to have on these trucks I believe in the lightnings? Idfk

 

I've never worried about skin oil on regular incandescent bulbs. Halogen (headlight bulbs, work lamps), yeah, wipe those down, but I don't think an 1156/1157 will get hot enough to care. I've seen them keep working in housings that were half full of water.

 

true, ive also had some that popped because they were hot and then the water in the housing splashed in a turn and bam Lol

 

See, there's the problem. Not enough water! Once the housing is pretty much full, that pesky thermal shock issue goes away.