I think it is bolted to the hatch pulldown motor. You could remove and reconnect it (may be oxidized and not making a good connection) or move it, or tie a ground to it if you had to and connect it to the body back there as well.


Also, try cleaning the contacts on the hatch "plate" with a pencil eraser. If those are dirty, that may be all you need.

 

i HAD TO USE A SCREWDRIVER AND SCRATCH IT UP GOOD ON MINE, I THEN WIPED ON SOME DIELECTRIC GREASE TO TRYU AND KEEP IN FROM CORRODING AGAIN




sorry for the caps, didn't see it till too late

 

Thanks guys I'm going to try to work on it today or tomorrow.

 

Well Im at a total loss. I ran another ground from maybe 3 inches away from the brake light connector to the power latch ground. (going to rig it to pass the inspection) Anyway, the damn light still doesnt work, I know I got the correct wire because a test light indicates power at the correct wire when the brake pedal is depressed and the other lights on. Im out of ideas.

 

Only idea I can think of is make sure the pins on the bulb are making contact in the socket holes, some times bulbs may look the same,but are differant. If the pins on the new bulbs are thinner than the old ones or spaced differantly they may not be making contact. Try putting a slight bend in the pin to make it a tighter fit. Also try resoldering the wires at the light block ,some times they may look good to the naked eye but are corroded in the solder.

 

Foglights was a bad relay, $10 later I'm back in business. (Thanks to GK from 3rdgen.org for help with the location) After 2 hrs or so of troubleshooting, splicing wires and the like, keep it simple stupid rang true. Apparently the bulbs (brakelight) are wrong.

Well 1 of 2 isnt bad, hopefully with some new bulbs it will be back to 100% asap.

 

i really didnt read that whole thread cause i just... well i didnt feel like it. but i had the same problem. i didnt replace any of the bulbs. I pulled them out and ran an ohms check on the whole assembly and came back with a possitive reading, so that told me that at least one light should come on if it has power. well, I started lookin around and it took me about 10 minutes or so of using a test light till i finally figured it out. on the rear piece of the trunk where the back panel is (where the hatch motor is mounted) is also where the rear light gets its power (you'll notice a 4 section panel that transfers power from the body of the car to the trunk hatch) well it was dirty and using a test light it showed good, but inside the trunk hatch there was no power, so i got some rubbing alcohol and a Q tip and scrubbed it for about 1 minute and it worked great from then on out. make sure you dont overlook that.

 

If the bulb change doesn't fix it put a new brakelight switch in it. The 3rd brakelight has it's own dedicated contact inside the switch (seperate from the contact for the regular brakelights) and that may be corroded or dirty.

 

If new bulbs doesn't fix the damn thing, I'm going to put a 3rd brake light-less spoiler on it to pass inspection.