Baystate Jeepers

Short story: heading home from dragway last night, my headlights went out. Possibly at the darkest road in all of NH. Fiddled with switch and they eventually came back on. Until I was a mile from home, and they quit again. But thankfully I made it within a mile of my house!

I didn't have time to check fuses or anything but here's the symptoms. With headlight switch pushed in, I have turn signals and my backups work. Pull the light switch and my dash lights come and but my turn signal indicator lights up with both arrows and hi beams. With light switch pulled, I have no turn signals or headlights. Push in switch and signals work

Did a little googling and found a similar problem.....

"I have a 93 Cherokee Country. When I pull my headlight switch my turn signal indicators and high beam indicators light up solid, no flash. I have taillights and brake lights. Turn signals dont flash on front or rear, they just stay solid. I had this problem last year and it was a connector under the dash being loose."

And a possible fix......??....

"behind the left side headlamp there is a large connector that controls all the front end lighting and the horn. this is a bad place for wiring rot when they get older. check this area"

My question is, have you ever seen or heard of this and what do you think? I haven't had a chance to look at it since last night, I was up and out at the crack of dawn this morning, and I'm in Maine today. But it's a long weekend and I'm already working on one Heep, may as well hit both of them! I have no experience with XJ electrical but have test equipment (Fluke DVM). I was almost hoping there was a relay for all the lights but that's to easy

Rather than start looking at every wire, if there's a place that's more likely to be a problem, I'm all ears. Thanks for any help / suggestions

Never seen or heard of that, but I don't have a newer XJ. That XJ forum might be a good place for ?'s.

The symptoms sound like possible grounding issues. Check all the bulbs, ground screws and terminal connections.

The signals sound like a grounding issue somewhere. No headlights could be a ground problem or messed up switch. I would check the connector for the front lighting harness (it's actually kinda under the air filter box) I've had/seen wires get corroded and break on either side of that connector.

well thanks guys. Just rolled back into town, going to go pop the hood and see what I can see

well what was it???

I'm a little late joining the discussion, so if you haven't found a solution, hopefully this will help. When troubleshooting an electrical problem, especially one that happens intermittently, it is important to check the points of contact. For your headlights, this will include the Switch, the Relay, and the connector on the headlight itself. John is correct that it could be a ground, but it is not the most likely culprit. In electrical systems, as with mechanical, it is the moving parts that are the weak links. Excess corrosion between the contacts in the switch, relay, or headlight harness can certainly produce an intermittent connection problem. As most contacts are made of copper or aluminum, they are prone to oxidize over time, and eventually this will prevent a solid electrical connection at your points of contact. The other possibility is that the coil in your head lamp relay is failing. Sometimes before the coil completely fails, it will "chatter," or not stay sealed in. I doubt this is the issue, since you didn't differentiate between having a problem with you high beams and not low beams, vice-versa, ect. I would say your first place to look would be whether your headlamp switch is working properly. Here's a test that will determine that, you will need a voltmeter:

1. Remove the headlamp relay from its socket.
2. You must determine which pins on the relay are the coil, it will be 2 pins (positive and negative) and they may or may not be marked, but they are likely to be physically further away from the other pins on the relay.
3. Determine where in the relay socket (base) these two pins correspond
4. Turn the ignition on
5. With the headlights off, check volts DC at the relay pins on the base, you should read close to 0 volts DC.
6. With the headlights on, check volts DC at the relay again. You should read either 5 volts DC, or 12 volts DC (depending on what the control voltage is on your vehicle.)

This test will verify that the dash switch is or is not working properly. If you don't get any voltage at the relay for step 6, you will need to replace your dash switch. If the switch is OK, it will more than likely either be the relay has gone bad, or you will need to clean the connection between the wiring harness and the headlight socket.

Hope this was helpful.

Duncan