Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Classic Morgans (pre-CX) Wiring oddity

Greetings All

Casually scouting through my wiring diagram and I came upon the item circled in red .

I can't seem to find a corresponding item on the car and it's not clear from the diagram if it's a switch, part of another switch or a relay (with the operating circuit 'simplified out')

I can see what it does ..... a changeover that gives you side/tail lights or just RH side/tail and drops an earth on the coil thereby disabling the ignition.

Is it some sort of Parking Mode that leaves your 'outside' lights lit? .... still don't see the need for the related earthed coil part though?

There will probably be some simple explanation I'm missing that everyone knows but me!





Cheers


K

|In the Brooklands Guide it's labelled as the Parking Switch

Thanks .... thought it was something along those lines ..... the diagram is for up to '73 and mine's a '75 so maybe never had one or it's been removed by a previous owner .... seems slightly overkill to short the coil to earth as a parking aid ..... does it say where the switch might have been situated ?(if out of the way I suppose it could have been a primitive immobiliser)

K

No, typically there is no other reference to it in the entire guide! I don't recall seeing it on mine. I don't think I have a 'park setting' on the ignition key, and certainly don't have a switch. It may be a +8 anomaly - I found this on eBay +8 Park Switch

Proberly a throw back to when cars had to leave a light on when parked on the street overnight.

On mine, you can turn the sidelights on without the key in the ignition so maybe that superceeded the additional parking light switch?

It's still law to use parking lights in certain situations

Thanks for the info .... there were all sorts of oddities over the years (I had a GT6 with a circuit that dimmed/brightened your tailights depending if it was day or night .... all very impressive but soon fell over and got ignored ... the '70s wasn't a happy period for mixing electronics and motor cars in general) Sounds like a period quirk and related to the +8 ..... the switch looks to be made to be on the dash in full view so the 'immobiliser' idea seems unlikely ..... any takers on explaining the ignition cutout function??

K

Prevents you driving off with parking lights left on?

You can find quite a few threads covering modern Mercedes, BMW and other German makes that have one-side-at-a-time parking lights as a standard option. But I can say that this is not a modern option at all, and while I don't think it was ever common on American cars - big,wide streets and all - it was certainly a feature in '60s and '70s German cars. Perhaps this was an option available for Morgans sent to Germany? Pre-wired/dealer installed? Just a guess. Saw interesting photos on Google of new MB's with two switches to select either left-side or right-side parking lamps.