01 SEAT Cordoba 1.4 petrol

Mursal said:
Auto electricity is an art-form
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:mrgreen:

I am very grateful to everyone who has helped and made suggestions. And in particular to Burnerman and Mursal for being there consistently! Thanks guys.

Yes, I think the next step is the bulbs and then the brake switches from the breaker. Still a little concerned over the reverse light though, as I cannot see that one being fixed by the switch replacement. Not due car test til the 3rd week of january so I guess I do have some time to get it sorted! I'll keep this thread posted as I go! Meantime, if anyone has any revelations.......!!!!! :)[/b]
 
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the reverse light issue is unlikely to be related, buy yourself a cheap mulitimeter and test at the lamp holder for voltage. If no voltage is present you need to inspect the wiring, a key failure area is the point where the wiring enters the tailgate from the car as its under a lot of stress
 
I'm wondering if the dealer was aware - or made you aware - of the potential problems this car has? It doesn't seem like it came with an MOT (or your equivalent) which is surprising.
John :)
 
John, the car is NCT'd(MOT) until the last week of January 2013. It was priced accordingly and the dealer said that the wheels needed balancing and the brakes needed ''doing''. As it turns out the tires needed replacing and the tracking rather than balance needed sorting. Brakes were ok(apart from the lights) which I still suspect(hope) is the switch. Once that gets done and the boot kit is sorted, it should be close to right.

ch427, in relation to the lights, the reverse light on the driver side didn't work, even after a bulb replacement. I just opened it up and took out the bulb that was in it and replaced it with a new version of that bulb? Unless it was the wrong bulb in the first place? I did notice that the wiring clip that is ''squeezed'' to remove it from the bulb had a break in the right side of the squeezer(for want of a better word). Only the left side of the squeezer clip still had tension. The other side had snapped. But the wiring into it seems to be ok? But I will try to get a closer look.
 
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Would a simple multimeter work for this test? And if I put one pole on the lamp holder, where do I place the other pole? Or am I thinking this the wrong way? :)
 
madder said:
Would a simple multimeter work for this test? And if I put one pole on the lamp holder, where do I place the other pole? Or am I thinking this the wrong way? :)
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yes, set on dc volts one probe to negative(various clean negative points around on the car body) one probe to lampholder.
It helps to use the negative at the light cluster as this can prove that it is ok
 
Cheers for that.

Update: The plot thickens. :)

I got the remaining bulb for my driver side brake light. Tested it and it worked fine. Only now the long window installed brake bulb isn't coming on, where it had been coming on previously(whenever EPC wasn't showing).

Furthermore, the EPC warning has not appeared in all the day so far.

Could it be that the plug for the window heater is plugged into the brake light and then the brake light plug to the window heater?

I'm going to get a multimeter maybe today to test the voltage of the lamp holders.

Just noticed also that the reverse light lamps are listed as being 12V 21W lamps, and the brake light lamps are 12V 12.5W. The failing reverse light currently has a brake light lamp installed. Could that 0.5W difference really be the problem? I guess, I'll switch them over and see what happens!
 
Unless I'm totally mistaken, don't stop lamps need to be 21W?
On the double filament bulbs, the tail is 5W and the stop 21W.
The reverse lamp can be any wattage as far as I know.
John :)
 
I would clamp a jump lead to a good earth point on the body of the car. Go directly to the negative terminal of the battery if you have to. Clamp the other end to a good clean steel part of the tailgate. In other words make a brand new (temporary) earth strap for the tailgate.

Check and double check it, because the tailgate has a bad earth.
 
This is all a great help guys. I have checked the reverse lamps and the one that works is a 21W. The one that doesn't work is a 21.5W. I switched them around and it made no difference. Same one worked, same one failed. Will do the voltage test, maybe in the morning.

On the very bright side, my brake lights all work now and the window heater also works now and the EPC dash warning seems to be gone. Could it be that carrying one bad brake light bulb threw the electrics into confused mode? :)

Only thing left now is the reverse lamp, driver side.

Oh, one other thing before I get too comfortable, is it normal for this car to not start on the key turn for a few seconds? Basically, I turn the key once, radio and air con start, and then turn for ignition and nothing happens. Air con switches off and no spark. Usually after a few seconds or couple more tries it starts fine. I should also point out that it usually starts first time, first thing in the morning, and this delay thingy only happens if I am restarting after a short trip.
 
I'm a little confused - you say one bulb is a 21W one, and the other is a 21.5W one.....? Are you sure the 21.5W bulb isn't a two filament, two terminal one?
Anyhow, you seem to be geting there, so well done so far!
I'm pondering on the starting issue....just try with the A/C off and see what happens.
John :)
 
Burnerman said:
I'm pondering on the starting issue....just try with the A/C off and see what happens.
John :)
Click to expand...

Will do.

About the bulbs. The 21W and 21/5W bulbs look very similar. I rang my local SEAT dealer and asked them which bulbs go where in the back of the car. They told me that the brake/stop bulbs are 21/5W and that the Reverse bulbs were 21W. But he said the reverse bulbs should probably work with either, but that mixing the 2 different bulbs across the reverse might be my problem, before I start checking the wiring. Does that sound about right?

Think earlier I said 21.5 but on the bulb it is marked as 21/5W. Probably a big diff between these!!!! :oops:
 
It's almost impossible to confuse a stop/tail (21/5W) bulb with a reverse light bulb. (21W)
Stop/tail bulb No 380 = http://tinyurl.com/cu325er

Reverse light bulb No 382 = http://tinyurl.com/cf5xmlz

Indicator bulb No 581 = http://tinyurl.com/c7trwms

On some vehicles the indicator and reverse light bulbs are the same as the second example.
I think those links have gone t!ts, I'll try to get them working in a bit. :oops:
 
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