Highbeams not working & "fast" turn indicator on instrument panel

[R3LYK_]

So for the past week or so, the left turn indicator on my dash has been fast blinking. The front and rear turn signals appeared to be working fine otherwise.

It wasn't until this morning that I noticed that the driver's side horizontal signature DRL bar (white LEDs) isn't always lit up when the running lights are on.

At first I assumed a bad wire, because I previously tapped into that wire when I had the "raptor style grille lights" installed.. it's just still too cold out to take things apart to investigate that.

But my issue gets a little murkier when I realized that neither high beams work .. like I would understand if only the driver's side high beam didn't work, but that both don't work has me a little puzzled.

Anyone have a similar issue?

Sponsored

 

[michelle227]

In the old days, a fast blink happened when a light on that side was burned out...no idea with the LED stuff if that is still true.

 

[BroncoChallenger]

Sounds like a wiring issue but you'll need to dig into it. Guessing the signature light not lighting up has something to do with it. High beams not working may or may not be related but betting they are.

Only experience I have with fast-blinking on newer vehicles is with my pontoon trailer, the adapter plug can get stuff built up in it (dirt, spider nest, etc), and the lack of connectivity causes a fast-blink on the dash because it thinks there's an issue...though the actual truck turn signal flashes normal speed.

 

[Brian_B]

The lights are mostly all driven by FETs (vs fused). If the FETs don’t see “normal” current for a light - either shorted or open circuit/high resistance - they will throw a “fast blink” for whatever light system that is. It is trying to emulate the old analog results when a turn lamp would burn out everything would blink faster so you knew there was an issue.

Once you can find and clear the fault the FET usually will auto-reset.

So i’d go looking around your tap and make sure that’s all good. The headlamp modules don’t have separate high and low beam wires - they just have a power supply line and a CAN bus connection that tells them what to do. Make sure you didn't tap into the CAN line to try to drive a relay or light or something

 

[R3LYK_]

The lights are mostly all driven by FETs (vs fused). If the FETs don’t see “normal” current for a light - either shorted or open circuit/high resistance - they will throw a “fast blink” for whatever light system that is. It is trying to emulate the old analog results when a turn lamp would burn out everything would blink faster so you knew there was an issue.

Once you can find and clear the fault the FET usually will auto-reset.

So i’d go looking around your tap and make sure that’s all good. The headlamp modules don’t have separate high and low beam wires - they just have a power supply line and a CAN bus connection that tells them what to do. Make sure you didn't tap into the CAN line to try to drive a relay or light or something

Yeah, when I originally tapped the wires I made sure to find the wiring diagram and only tap the positive wire for the DRLs. I just don't remember what I did to that wire when I removed the tap and the raptor lights last spring.

I definitely have to dig into it on my end - I'm just waiting for this god forsaken snow to melt.

Just wasn't expecting it to disable my highbeams

 

[BrdBronco]

I had the exact same issues that you describe. I purchased a used 2022 Wildtrak last January. The previous owner had quite a few accessories added, mostly lights. In September my driver side blinker started blinking fast but all blinkers worked fine. I also had no bright lights even though the dash indicator showed they were on. The DRLs on both sides randomly stopped working and then working again.

Dealer didn’t want to dig in with all the accessories so I removed everything I could and took back to them. They found that pins 15 and 16 in the wire harness were backwards. I think this was the wire harness to the body control module. They swapped them and so far so good. It has only been about 2 months so far.

I learned a lot about Bronco wiring over the last 6 months and how to tear it apart. BTW, no way for me to know if the previous owner did something to switch those wires but wasn’t covered by extended warranty. Good luck.

 

[4x4TruckLEDs.com]

So for the past week or so, the left turn indicator on my dash has been fast blinking. The front and rear turn signals appeared to be working fine otherwise.

It wasn't until this morning that I noticed that the driver's side horizontal signature DRL bar (white LEDs) isn't always lit up when the running lights are on.

At first I assumed a bad wire, because I previously tapped into that wire when I had the "raptor style grille lights" installed.. it's just still too cold out to take things apart to investigate that.

But my issue gets a little murkier when I realized that neither high beams work .. like I would understand if only the driver's side high beam didn't work, but that both don't work has me a little puzzled.

Anyone have a similar issue?

Out of curiosity are you running a fog kit that utilizes a headlight tap?

 

[R3LYK_]

Out of curiosity are you running a fog kit that utilizes a headlight tap?

Not a fog kit, but I do now have the RTR grille that has the extra DRLs and their extra little wiring harness.

 

[4x4TruckLEDs.com]

Not a fog kit, but I do now have the RTR grille that has the extra DRLs and their extra little wiring harness.

Hmm not too sure. If you had a fog kit that used an in-line plug connecter to the headlight that could cause an issue, but you're not doing that at all.

I've never seen a small LED tapped off the harness do anything BUT try disconnecting that. See what happens.

Do you have factory headlights? Factory tail lights?

 

[R3LYK_]

Hmm not too sure. If you had a fog kit that used an in-line plug connecter to the headlight that could cause an issue, but you're not doing that at all.

I've never seen a small LED tapped off the harness do anything BUT try disconnecting that. See what happens.

Do you have factory headlights? Factory tail lights?

Yeah, Factory headlights and taillights.

The LEDs are no longer tapped into the harness anymore. My thought process right now is that I didn't properly protect the area where the tap was connected and it might have broke or something. At least.. that's what I'm thinking in regards to the driver side DRL bar.

I am still confused as to what's affecting my highbeams.

I will definitely be posting an update (including pictures) once I'm able to pull everything apart to investigate.

 

[R3LYK_]

Update: So I haven't yet pulled things apart to check the wiring but I don't think it's a wiring gremlin at this point. I've attached a picture of what my front end looks like for visual reference.

Here's a breakdown of my issues thus far.

• LH turn indicator blinks fast on the dash (both front and rear turn signals appear to be flashing normally)
• Highbeams NOT working on either LH or RH headlight assemblies.
• DRLs on both headlight assemblies stay on for ~10minutes after the vehicle is turned off and locked. This applies to only the factory Bronco DRLs (so the signature bar & circle) the RTR grille lights turn off normally.

I have tried disconnecting the battery for an extended period of time, and I have pulled fuses just to see what would happen. Tomorrow, I'll be plugging in my laptop and FORSCAN to see if maybe I have some codes .. I honestly don't know what else it could be...

Electrical gremlins suck.

 

[R3LYK_]

Update 2: .. so according to FORSCAN, BdyCM is throwing B14E7:08 and B14E7:08 codes. Basic description is "Bus Signal/Message Failure"

 

[BroncoBillyMichaelRaptor]

Update 2: .. so according to FORSCAN, BdyCM is throwing B14E7:08 and B14E7:08 codes. Basic description is "Bus Signal/Message Failure"

I have the exact same issue as you and the same symptoms. What did you end up finding out was the fix? I’m kinda clueless on this one!

 

[R3LYK_]

I have the exact same issue as you and the same symptoms. What did you end up finding out was the fix? I’m kinda clueless on this one!

Alright, I had forgotten to post an update once I did find and fix the problem.. so here we go:

Firstly I took everything apart and found a bunch of corrosion between the main harness and the extension harness that came with the RTR grille. This is likely my fault when I installed it, and didn't apply any dielectric grease in the connector so water eventually penetrated it. You can kinda see some remnant of the corrosion on the circled pins in the picture. Cleaning this up solved the LH blinker indicator flashing fast on the dash, and the RH DRLs staying on however it did NOT fix the issues with the LH DRLs or the highbeams.

So after that I assumed that maybe I fried the little control unit at the bottom of the LH headlight assembly. I ordered a replacement online (which was later returned when I found out my real issue) but now would need to tear the entire front end apart to get good access to the headlight assembly.

Now once I did, before doing anything drastic, I swapped headlight assembles (LH to RH and vice versa) and the problem remained only on the LH light. Which eliminated my theory that I had damaged the LED control unit on the assembly. After digging a little more and inspecting connections I found the real culprit - the corrosion that I found earlier had absolutely destroyed the connection on the wire-side of the body harness for the headlight.

Now my solution to the issue wasn't elegant.. I just stripped the end of the damaged wire, and cut the appropriate wire on the other side of the RTR grille harness (the side that connected to the headlight) and spliced them together. Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture of the final "fix".

A quick reset of the headlight / BodyCM system using Forscan and the faults went away and everything works as it should.

It goes without saying that there's dielectric grease in those and any other connections I had previously installed on the Bronco now just to hopefully avoid any future headaches like this

Hopefully this helps you / anyone else that might have a similar issue.

Sponsored