ha... bet you all thought i was having problems with my interior lights staying on and all i had to do was buy some WD-40.

Sorry my problem is the opposite. mine wont come on.... some of the time. every once in awhile when i get in my truck i have no dome lights, no guage lights, no map lights, no nuthing. i drive for a bit (5 min or so) and poof i hear a clicking sound like i hit a switch, and everything works fine.
Any suggestions?

Also i was wondering if there was a way to make the low beams stay on when you engage the high beams. (like when you pull back on the "stick")

My truck is a '02 f150 xtr if you need to know that.

 

I would say it sounds ( no pun intended ) like a problem with the interior lamp relay ( Relay #1 Central Juntion box aka : "inside the pass compartment fuse box" , owners manual page 211 ).
To confirm this, when the interior lamps don't work, the radio and power windows work fine ?
You could try to swap with relay #2, to see if it cures the interior lamp problem.
The thing with this is, the battery saver relay shuts the iterior lamps off after a key off, prior to a door being opened after the time expires.
I don't know if this will show the same exact problem with the interior lamps if relay #1 is bad, and now you have it feeding the "good" relay you put into position #2 ?? You can try it, or just go to AutoZone and purchase a new relay for testing. Ford gets ~ 17.00 for them, I want to say AutoZone ( if they have it in stock ) gets ~ 12.00 for the aftermarket ones. Relacing Relay #1 with a new one, is the best ( but not cheapest ) test for this problem.

You can get some WD-40 while you are there, and ....... oh sorry wrong thread

You might want to start a new post for this, but a quick item on it.

1. The heat build up in the headlamp bucket from running both lamps at the same time might cut short your headlamp life. Just something to be aware of with this mod.

2. Do you have an aftermarket lamp like a Sylvania SilverStar in them now ? I thought they did a better job of filling in the lower area, but not to 100% low beam look. Just a thought.

3. Have you thought about adding in clear fog lamps to fill the void left by the high beams ? This is the best way to cure the problem, and give you a bit more ditch to ditch lighting when using your low beams, but it is costs more, and you might not like the look of this option, once installed on the truck.

The common answer that some give is use a large diode, but the problem with this :

1. It puts the electrical load of the low beam element on the high beam wiring harness. You have 55W of additional load on with the 65W element, effectivly doubling the load on the high beam circuit. Not a good thing.

The best way to do this is with a relay, and a new harness for powering the low beam when the high beam is on. Requires a bit more work, but provides a seperate load path for the low beam elements when the high beam is on.
This is a DIY project, if you are up for it, create a new thread, and post the URL here for a reply, and we will get working on it.

Steve

 

thanks steve i should have mentioned i bought some aftermarket headlights. So the high and low bulbs are in seperate places. so heating shouldnt be a problem. i will start a new thread for it i dont have time right now but i'll get to it.

 

anyone have any pictures of pg 211 of the owners manual i dont have one

 

download one for free here....

click for link

 

My interior lights do not come on also. I tried the relay swap but that did not work. I will go try to buy a relay to see if that works. I hope someone figures it out

 

If my Haynes manual is correct then the Gem module controls the Battery Saver relay which supplys power to the coild of the interior light relay. There appears to be more than one relay involved here and the possibility of the Gem module itself.

On my 1999 5.4L F150 Relay #1 is the Interior Lamp Relay and Relay #2 is the Battery Saver Relay.

If the Battery Saver Relay is bad then the interior lamp relay will not receive power. If the interior lamp relay is bad but the battery saver relay is good then you should still have map lights, engine compartment light and glove compartment light. Since you say you have neither map nor dome lights then the battery saver relay is the prime suspect. If you swap relay one and two and still do not get at least a map light (assuming the bulbs work) then the prime suspect is the gem module.

 

I have the exact same setup. And the relay swap did not solve anyting. I will get the relay but I am afraid it will not solve anyting

 

The quick test ( like temp1 pointed out ) is with the reays in the starting position ( before the swap ) do the power windows and the radio still work after the key is shut off ?

This would indicate that the battery saver and delay assy relays are good.

After the swap, did everything ( windows / radio ) quit working ?

If the bad relay is now in the battery saver position, nothing would work, until you heard the click

 

When I switched the relays everyting is as before. The radio and power windows still work. Hmmmm.... This is becoming a challange.

I do appreciates everyones feedback and assistance by the way.

 

I do have map lights and also lights in the glove box (relays in either position).

 

I just realized ( call me a bit slow the other day ) that the member changed up on the trouble shooting ( went form a '02 to a '99 ).

Q1. One additional question, you don't have interior lights went you open AND when you use the interior lamp switch on the dash ?

Q2. The battery Junction box fuse 15 ( 10 AMP ) is good ?

What you are talking about is just the interior lamps ( overhead console ) and door entry lamps ( if equiped...this is a '02 diagram I am looking at ).

 

Answer to your questions

Q1. I do not have lights when the door opens or when I use the interior lamp switch.

Q2. I will check that specific fuse again. I checked all the fuses before that ran the system but I will reverify that fuse.

One think I noticed is when I move the interior lamp switch I get a little static on the radio. So I am not sure if the switch is having a connection problem or not. But the lights do not come on.

Thanks for the continued help

 

I was checking the fuse panel again and the fuse that controled the system worked just fine. So I thought, why not check the bulbs or circuits to see if power is getting to the unit and perhaps the bulbs are burnt out.

Well I opened up one side and guess what I found? Nothing!! no bulb in the socket. So I decided to check the power and there is 12V there.

Here is my conclusion. The previous owners of the vehicle (I did just buy this one) probably had the issue with the lights staying on all the time. In fine Colorado wisdom thier solution was to take out all the bulbs to not run down the battery. I will get me some bulbs and do the WD-40 trick to make sure the switches are not sticking and go from there.

Thank you all for providing input to the solution. I just had to be smarter than the person before me. It is now time for one of these

 

Just for closure I added all the lights and they worked just perfectly. And since I put WD-40 in eailer I did not have the light staying on problem