[DeTomaso] Electrical gremlin(s)

[tmshinro at aol.com]

 OK, I'm getting down to the short list of things that need fixing.   I rarely drive my car at night with the lights on but whenever I did I didn't have any problems over the last 24 years.   So imagine my surprise while driving to NC for the Summer Summit when my #3 fuse blew when I turned on the lights.   This is the 8 amp fuse that controls the left taillight, right front parking light, left rear and right front marker lights, one of the license plate lights (can't remember which one) and the instrument illumination lights.   So when driving at night I can't see any of the instruments.  I never had this, or any, fuse blow before so I put a new one in the next morning and pushed the light switch to the first position and all the lights came on.   I thought the problem was solved but when we came back late from our driving day and turned on the lights everything was lit up for about 20 seconds and the fuse blew again.  I didn't have any more fuses and I didn't have to drive at night on the trip home, so I'm now trying to figure out what is wrong.

The only thing I've done to the car electrically within the last several years was replace the lower rocker switch that controls the light that shines above the console when the lights are on.  The switch worked when I put it in and during the brief time the lights were working on the trip.   Since that was the only thing I did the car, today I pulled the gage panel and unplugged the switch to see if that would make a difference.  While I had the panel out I also sprayed some contact cleaner into the instrument dimmer switch (front and back).  I then put in a new fuse and moved the light switch to the first position and the fuse immediately blew.

Electricity is not my strong suit, so I'm looking for help/suggestions on how to track down the reason my fuse keeps blowing.  

Thanks,

Tom 
#5186