I was driving home from work one night when the "taillight" warning <br>light came on. When I got home, I kept the light on and got out of <br>the car to see the taillights. They were out. I checked the bulbs <br>and found one broken. I replace the broken bulb. Now the warning <br>light has gone away, but the taillights still don't work. The funny <br>thing is that the brake lights work. When I press on the brake pedal <br>both filament of the taillight/brake-light bulb are lit. I checked <br>the 15A taillight fuse and taillight relay and there are all fine. <br>Does anyone have any other idea as to whatelse could be wrong?<br><br>Thanks you attention,<br><br>Supra88TT

When you hit the brakes, both the tail light and the brake light filiments are lit? That is indeed a strange thing to have happen. <br><br>First, get yourself one of those little electrical probe testers- the kind that look like light pens, find a good groung spot and then turn on the lights and check the tail light side of the socket. The pen light should light up if you have power going to it. Then turn off the lights, and check the brake side of the socket. That should tell you what's going on right then and there. (You don't have to go nuts and get a mulitmeter for this, simple IS better)<br><br>It's easy to trouble shoot electrical stuff on cars. Don't worry about getting shocked, it isn;t even enough to hurt. Think of electricals like a water pipe and you need to find out if there is water down the line where you want it, if it isn't, then the leak must be farther up, right? If there isn't any juice on the end, go farther up the wire until you find some. The trouble will be between that point and where you want it. <br><br>If you poke your tester into the wire at the base of the socket and it lights up ok, but not at the contact patches on the socket, then the socket is TU. It's simple. methodical work.<br><br>I think it could be a couple of things. You could have a bad socket that is grounding the system before the light lights up or isn't in good contact with the lght any more. You could have a corroded tail lamp ground (or contact patch) that makes it difficult for the lower wattage brake lights to ground out and light up, but the higher wattage brake lights can penetrate the corrosion and go to ground and you get both lights then. (check and make sure the grounds are clean- if your tester lights up normal when you touch the socket plugs, this is THE most likely cause and a little sand paper will clean it easy enough) Worst case is that somehow the wires got nicked farther up and are in contact with each other and this is causing them to short out with each other, too dim to light both filiments up on the tail lights' juice alone, but bright enough to get both going when you jump on the brakes.<br><br>The worst thing I can see you doing here is replacing the sockets and and they shouldn't be too expensive at all. Don't go OEM, the junk yard or an autoparts store should have generic pieces- they should be pretty common among Toyotas.

Greetings,<br><br>First of all, I want to thank you for your great advice and taking the time to make such a detail explination with layman terminology.<br><br>Unfortunately, do to a lack of time, lazziness, and need for my car at night, I took my car down to the dealer.<br><br>I'm sure if you were here you fix it in 20 minutes. I'm just getting started and I'm learning new things about my car everyday.<br><br>The dealer said that a bad ground have shorted out the taillight relay which resides in the rear of the car, near the taillights. I didn't know that. I checked the taillight fuse and what I believe was the taillight relay in the driver side compartment. They were both fine.<br><br>1 - taillight relay $145<br>1 - hour labor $105<br>So, $260 later, my brake light work and I can drive at night again.<br><br>Next time, when I get my Toyota Repair Manual, I will know to check everything.<br><br>Thanks again,<br>Cheers,<br><br>Bryster 88TT

Well, expensive dealer bills are the reason we all learn to work on our cars in the first place. My own philosophy is that it's fun to tinker on cars, unless you have to use them every day. If you have to use the thing, screw tinkering, just get the darn thing fixed, I need it.<br><br>I wasn't aware there was a relay back there. That'd kill a relay fast though. Thaks for your answer.