** Reply to message from Wil Haslup <dhaslup@EROLS.COM> on Thu, 24
Sep 1998 21:14:58 -0400
> The middle position of the interior light switch is off, the up
position is on
> when door is open.  Is the bottom position manual on all the time?

Yes it is.

>
> I've recently tried to undo the damage a previous owner did to my
'80 Vanagon
> when he installed a radio...he pulled the wires from the lighter
and a hot wire
> from the headlight switch (small red, not fused)...there are a
couple stray
> brown grounds too.

The red wire should be from fuse 9 to either the clock or the radio.
The lighter should have a 16 ga. red from fuse 8, and a twin brown --
one side goes to ground and the other to some panel light (unlabeled).
The light for the cig. lighter is grounded through the lighter housing.

>
> I'm guessing that the bottom position of the interior light
switches is manual
> "on" but since it doesn't work I believe it to be in the same
circuit as the
> lighter since I've removed that fuse.

The light *should* be on fuse 8 along with the cig lighter and brake
lights.  However if it's working with the door switches it's obviously
not on the circuit you've de-fused.  The bottom (constant-on) terminal
should have a double brown (remember that *this* light is switched
from the ground side, so the door switches can be simple) -- one side
goes to ground and the other to the corresponding terminal on the rear
light if you have one.

All of these ground connections should terminate at one of the
multi-tab grounds to the left of the fuse/relay panel.
>

All of the above is from the wiring diagram in Bentley, not personal
knowledge...

david

David Beierl <dbeierl@ibm.net>
401 274-5827 voice, -6349 fax
OS/2 V4, FP7, JVM 1.1.6, JSM 98.6.3