reverse light ON

[chadiusmax]

Hi
I just bought my very first car for me - a 1977 Pontiac Astre coupe. When I picked it up everything seemed great until my son said I had no reverse lights. Lo and behold the fix seemed super easy, there we no bulbs in the sockets. I went to buy new bulbs 1156's and they didn't fit the sockets. These were 1157 sockets. So I got 1157 bulbs and voila reverse lights. But now they never go off.

I am not sure where to start - the backup connector or tracing the wires.

Any help would be appreciated

Chad

1977 astre.jpeg

[spencerforhire]

If it's an automatic, the reverse light switch is on the shifter; if it's a stick, it's on the transmission. In either case the wires are pink(ignition+) and light green(to lights). The sockets should NOT take an 1157 bulb; the only 2 wires on the reverse light socket should be the aforementioned light green and a black ground wire, and take the 1156 bulb that you tried first.

[chadiusmax]

I got the wiring diagram from you thanks. 5 speed manual by the way

Someone replaced the sockets for the reverse lights with the wrong sockets. There are only two wires going to the socket one black ground and one green.

Is the switch accessible through the shifter or do I come from below. I really need a book. I should head to the local part store.

[spencerforhire]

An 1157 dual contact socket normally has 3 wires; black=ground, brown=tail and on the rear yellow=left turn or green=right turn. If you only have green and black, look carefully to see if there's one or two contacts down inside; if there's two, you may have only green and brown and this older style socket would have been grounded where in clipped into a metal signal light housing.
The reverse light switch will have to be accessed from under the car; just unplug it to see if the lights go out.

[chadiusmax]

Thanks for all the advice. I was able to obtain a switch on ebay (from arizona $5) and replaced it in my driveway. I should have figured that the transmissioon oil would come out of the hole as well. I managed to only spill a little before I stuck my finger in the hole. An easy fix and the lights are opperating perfectly. the old switch had a large amount of sand in the seal and wouldn't shut off.