I recently purchased a 67 SS Chevelle and it has some electrical problems. I have headlights and tail lights but I don't have brake lights or turn signals. I replaced the fuse for the brake lights and my headlights went out and I still didn't have brake lights. A few minutes later the fuse burnt out and my headlights came back. I have power at the brake pedal and power to the bulbs at the tail but no signals or brake lights. Any suggestions would be a great help since I am not great at tracking electrical problems.

Thanks,

Brad

Sounds like a ground problem. Start by cleaning and re-grounding the tail light housings and then do the headlights.

I recently purchased a 67 SS Chevelle and it has some electrical problems. I have headlights and tail lights but I don't have brake lights or turn signals. I replaced the fuse for the brake lights and my headlights went out and I still didn't have brake lights. A few minutes later the fuse burnt out and my headlights came back. I have power at the brake pedal and power to the bulbs at the tail but no signals or brake lights. Any suggestions would be a great help since I am not great at tracking electrical problems.

Thanks,

Brad

Also sounds like a short somewhere or more than one problem.
Does "power at the bulbs" mean on both the taillight AND brake light/turn signal wires?

The brake light fuse really should't have anything to do with the headlights. Now IF you were to replace the taillight fuse and there was a short it might possibly cause the headlight circuit breaker to cycle off before the new fuse blew again but that wouldn't have anything to do with the brake light/turn signals either plus you say the taillights work.

I'm thinking there might be a problem with the turn signal switch plus bad grounds and maybe even a short also.
I don't see how you could have power at the brake pedal with a blown brake light fuse.

Thanks for the help. I have power at both the tail light wire and the turn signal wire in the trunk. I have power at the brake pedal as well. I think I have a short somewhere but I wonder if the turn signal unit might be the problem as well. I would appreciate any help.

Thanks!

Thanks for the help. I have power at both the tail light wire and the turn signal wire in the trunk. I have power at the brake pedal as well. I think I have a short somewhere but I wonder if the turn signal unit might be the problem as well. I would appreciate any help.

Thanks!

If you have power to the tail light wire and turn signal wire in the trunk, then it's not likely a short. Do you have power to the bulb socket? Check each of the contacts. If you have power to the socket, are you getting good contact from the socket to the bulb? Does the socket have a good ground?

Brad – per an email I sent you we had the same problem description on a 1969 Chevelle

What we found:

On a 1969 Chevelle there are 7 or so wires that leave the fuse box and run on the floor
Brown - Constant power to tail lights (including license light)
Drk Grn – Driver Brake (power triggered by the brake toggle button)
Yellow - Passenger Brake (power triggered by the brake toggle button)
White – deals with Dome light
Orange – deals with Dome light
Lt Grn – backup lights (powered when in reverse)
Tan – Fuel meter

We first tested the power in the trunk and found only the Brown and Tan to have power (thus we had tail lights but no break lights). The light green we weren’t concerned with at this time. With the brake toggle out (break on) the Drk Green and Yellow should have had power but they didn’t. If you have power at the wire in the trunk then it’s your socket or bulb. By default if you have tail-lights your lights are grounded – we took ours out of the socket and grounded them with a wire so we could see the light easier.

We then checked the power at the wires coming out of the fuse box and found the same situation to exist. If we had found that the Drk Grn and Yellow had power hear it would have meant that there was a break in the wire between the fuse box and the trunk.

The fuse box contains your Hazard flasher, near the radio is often your turn signal flasher (of course it is a safe step to replace both of these), these ultimately feed into the same Drk Grn and Yellow wires from a power perspective and the flasher just breaks the power at intervals. We found that we weren’t getting any power at these locations.

The next failure point is then the steering week or steering column. To some degree it is one big breaker as it has power in and power out. Typically if your starter is working then you have power into the column and your ignition switch completes power to both your starter and coil (I believe). We tested the same wire connections here and found that once again there was no power out in the wires we expected.

There turned out to be a short in the steering column – when the guy rebuilt the column a metal piece fell out of place and became lodged – he forced the assembly together to the point it caused a short. To fix we had to remove/disassemble much of the steering column. Once opened and “loosened/flexible” we were able to wiggle and test various areas to confirm there was a short. In certain positions we got break lights and then they’d go off again. My friend didn’t have a batter charger and I forgot mine. At 40 degrees in the garage and after an hour or two the battery called it quits. We think we’ll get it resolved now that we’ve found our problem area.