TheSamba.com :: View topic - 6v pushbutton switch to 12v headlight relay questions

Sat Sep 08, 2012 1:57 pm

I'm trying to finish up the wiring on Mark's SB.

We bought the VW 111 941 583 headlight relay from ISP

The wiring diagram, which matches the car wiring exactly, shows terminals J, 30, 56a, F, S, and 56.

The new 12v relay has terminals 56, 56a, 56b, S and 30. (pictures below)

So, the question(s) is:

Terminal 56b from the pushbutton switch on the car goes to the fuse block then to the headlights, should this now got to the 56b on the relay? But then what would go to the headlights?

What are terminals J and F for on the pushbutton switch?

Thanks for any help, ISP said they didn't know much about wiring and a search on here didn't yeild any help.

Thanks

Sat Sep 08, 2012 3:09 pm

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/archives/info/wiring/Un...l_2003.pdf

this will tell you the designations for the numbers

Sat Sep 08, 2012 6:02 pm

Thanks for the link but it didn't help much. Doesn't tell what F and J are.

Mon Sep 10, 2012 7:08 am

Hey Roy,
Check out this old thread of mine for descriptions of J and F. Russ Wolfe and Gregson chimed in with some great information and I got some nice detailed photos from Sebastian.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=446490&highlight=

W1k1 - thanks for that article, that was great.

Mon Sep 10, 2012 4:13 pm

drivingpenguin wrote: Hey Roy,
Check out this old thread of mine for descriptions of J and F. Russ Wolfe and Gregson chimed in with some great information and I got some nice detailed photos from Sebastian.

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=446490&highlight=

W1k1 - thanks for that article, that was great.

So if understand that post correctly, J and #30 from the push button switch get tied together and go to terminal 30 on the 12v relay.

The F wire from the pb switch can be disconnected completely and the 56b terminal from the 12v relay can go to the fuse block and on to the headlights like it does now.

W1k1, I hope my reply didn't come off as unappreciated, it certainly wasn't meant to sound that way.

Fri Mar 15, 2013 11:23 am

I need to rant for a minute. This is such a crock of shit, this thread links to the only other thread i could find about this subject... yet neither actually gives any conclusion as to how this is supposed to go 100%.
Im working on it now. If i can come up with an answer i will post it.
If anyone else has come up with an answer... please post it here so that everyone in the future can see how to do it.
Im guessing that its VERY RARE to have a pushbutton notch that works and is 12V?

Just pissed that there are so many of these cars and ZERO info exists. The ISP west paper was written by a 3 year old and is a joke at best.
I just spent 5 hours rewiring the car perfect and have no headlights....lol

Fri Mar 15, 2013 11:50 am

mightymouse wrote: I need to rant for a minute. This is such a crock of shit, this thread links to the only other thread i could find about this subject... yet neither actually gives any conclusion as to how this is supposed to go 100%.
Im working on it now. If i can come up with an answer i will post it.
If anyone else has come up with an answer... please post it here so that everyone in the future can see how to do it.
Im guessing that its VERY RARE to have a pushbutton notch that works and is 12V?

Just pissed that there are so many of these cars and ZERO info exists. The ISP west paper was written by a 3 year old and is a joke at best.
I just spent 5 hours rewiring the car perfect and have no headlights....lol

Hold on here a minute. I've done it, but I do agree that there's no info on doing it. I spent a few days with the wiring diagrams you need the 1500 version that shows the PB unit, and a later model one to see how the relay is set up, then an ohm meter to finish working it out. I did this, as I didn't want to burn up an expensive switch. I made a bunch of notes, and even sketched it out, but I can't find my notes. The biggest issue I was trying to overcome was the wiper half of the switch, as I wanted to run a 2 speed wiper motor. The headlight side turned out easy compared to it. I'll try and find my notes, but it might be a while before I can post them up.

I think I eliminated a couple of wires when I did it, to simplify the install (made it more like a late model). Note, this was almost 2 years ago that I did this.

Fri Mar 15, 2013 12:31 pm

Thanks a bunch man. I just worked with the meter and got the low beams working. But the ISP relay doesnt respond to the S terminal being grounded. As in, it wont switch to high beams.
That and the wipers just run constantly.
So those are the only two issues i have left to iron out.

ANY info would be helpful and very much appreciated.
Hopefully we can get this thread to sticky status with all the proper info to make it work.

Fri Mar 15, 2013 1:34 pm

wipers are sorted. wire colors matched up = park signal to low wiper operation. WTF. lol
So now its all good. I only have low wiper speed of course since orig PB unit.

All thats left is, how to get relay to switch and see if i have high beams.
And im 99% sure brand new relay is bad cause it wont click. OR its wired wrong due to not having proper info. (it has its own diagram on the side and im elec certified so i see what it does and how it works, but it wont pull like its supposed to when ground is applied)
Its wired exactly how the instructions say to wire it. Thats how its been wired since moment one. Only thing is in the instructions it says put the yellow wire to terminal 56 on pb switch. Yellow wire is the low beams and never has ANY power with the current wiring.
Terminal 56 from the push button switch does and is large white with blue stripe, so i connected it to 56 on the relay. the way the wording says, NOT by color.
THAT makes the low beams work with the jumper wires from 56a and b to the highs and lows on fuse box.

In the end... gonna post exactly the way its wired. almost there!

Fri Mar 15, 2013 7:25 pm

mightymouse wrote: wipers are sorted. wire colors matched up = park signal to low wiper operation. WTF. lol
So now its all good. I only have low wiper speed of course since orig PB unit.

All thats left is, how to get relay to switch and see if i have high beams.
And im 99% sure brand new relay is bad cause it wont click. OR its wired wrong due to not having proper info. (it has its own diagram on the side and im elec certified so i see what it does and how it works, but it wont pull like its supposed to when ground is applied)
Its wired exactly how the instructions say to wire it. Thats how its been wired since moment one. Only thing is in the instructions it says put the yellow wire to terminal 56 on pb switch. Yellow wire is the low beams and never has ANY power with the current wiring.
Terminal 56 from the push button switch does and is large white with blue stripe, so i connected it to 56 on the relay. the way the wording says, NOT by color.
THAT makes the low beams work with the jumper wires from 56a and b to the highs and lows on fuse box.

In the end... gonna post exactly the way its wired. almost there!

I used a late 311 part numbered relay (not the ISP part). I want to say it was a 5 terminal one, but it might have been a 4 terminal unit. I ran the yelllow (56a) and white (F) wires from the fusebox to the relay, and the white with a stripe was the power on (headlights). I think I used the #30, to power the relay (but, it's been 2 years, and I've slept since then), and the tan with a white stripe wire for the "S" terminal. Note, the 311 relay is externally grounded (the metal shell), so you'll need the tan wire going to body ground, along with the case of the relay clipped to the body. I didn't worry about the balance of the wires (I taped the ends of those not used), as they weren't used for the lights, just to power up other stuff (so they kept their regular job as shown in the wiring diagrams. The gray #58 wire went to the parking light fuse as normal too. Keep in mind, that a lot of the extra wires used were because VW was trying to avoid a voltage drop (high resistance).

In my case, I had to add a second switch, which controls the wiper speeds. I still use the PB unit to turn it on and off, but the 2nd switch controls how fast it runs.

You might want to use an ohm meter to verify your dip switch does work (I replaced mine as the wires had some chaffing), and also check that it's grounded good.

Sat Mar 16, 2013 2:00 am

got it...

YES my ISP relay was broken. I took the cover off and the shunt wasnt even soldered to the proper post. I repaired it and adjusted the relay and it works perfect now.

So....

Terminal 30 on relay is constant power from red small wire 30 from PB switch
Terminal 56 from PB switch no matter the color to 56 pin on relay
Terminal 56A on relay is high beams and you run a wire from relay to fuse box to power high beams
Terminal 56B is low beams and you also run a wire from the relay to the fuse box to power the low beams
Terminal S on the relay gets the brown and white wire S from the turn signal switch. This is ground signal to make the relay switch circuits.

You end up NOT using 5 wires from the PB switch. the yellow and white headlight wires, and the brown and blue and other white.
THAT is crazy.

Im comfy now with type 3 wiring. after 10 hours or so working with all this. every light on the car now works. :)

With the now totally messed up pushbutton wiring, no power was making it to the little fender marking lights. So i added a pigtail to the tail light circuit so now they are fused and on as markers. ^_^

Sat Mar 16, 2013 7:02 am

mightymouse wrote: got it...

YES my ISP relay was broken. I took the cover off and the shunt wasnt even soldered to the proper post. I repaired it and adjusted the relay and it works perfect now.

So....

Terminal 30 on relay is constant power from red small wire 30 from PB switch
Terminal 56 from PB switch no matter the color to 56 pin on relay
Terminal 56A on relay is high beams and you run a wire from relay to fuse box to power high beams
Terminal 56B is low beams and you also run a wire from the relay to the fuse box to power the low beams
Terminal S on the relay gets the brown and white wire S from the turn signal switch. This is ground signal to make the relay switch circuits.

You end up NOT using 5 wires from the PB switch. the yellow and white headlight wires, and the brown and blue and other white.
THAT is crazy.

Im comfy now with type 3 wiring. after 10 hours or so working with all this. every light on the car now works. :)

With the now totally messed up pushbutton wiring, no power was making it to the little fender marking lights. So i added a pigtail to the tail light circuit so now they are fused and on as markers. ^_^

I turned mine into side turn signals. :D For that I used a push on 1 to 2 spade terminal (looks like a brass "Y") on my TS flasher, then brought 1 of the 2 small gray wires from the ignition switch harness over to it (used an ohm meter to find the right one). This is because the early TS switches have the wiring already there for the side marker lights (the extra gray wires on the terminal block). Those wires were already attached, and by adding that 1 gray wire to the flasher, turned them into side mounted turn signals. 8)

Yes, it's crazy that you don't need 5 wires from the PB unit when you convert to 12 volt, but VW used then to avoid the voltage drop from only having 6 volts. Good Job. Now go have a beer, you earned it. 8)

Sun Aug 25, 2013 11:21 pm

This info was very helpful. Thanks to all contributors.

Mon Aug 26, 2013 9:00 pm

chizucc wrote: This info was very helpful. Thanks to all contributors.

In the end, we wired the old 6v relay back in and everything works perfect.

Tue Aug 27, 2013 12:34 pm

IAMIROY wrote:

In the end, we wired the old 6v relay back in and everything works perfect.

really? Are you running anything 12v? I was very confused with the 12v conversion until your post and now everything is running good....

Tue Aug 27, 2013 8:11 pm

Changed all the bulbs to 12v and it's good to go. You do have reduce the voltage to the wiper motor though to slow it down. I went through post after post trying to read how people were making the 12v flasher work. Then someone posted in a thread that they have been using the 6v flasher for years with no problems. I wish had seen that earlier lol

Sun Sep 07, 2014 8:17 am

I'm attempting to finish up a 12 volt conversion on my early 64 Variant S.

I pulled the 6 volt headlight relay and discovered 6 pins vs. the 5 pins on all of my 12 volt headlight relays...and every relay I've found on the web, thus far.

6 volt relay has a few extra wires, as does the pushbutton assembly.

Does anyone have a "Barney style" diagram that explains how I might use either a 5 pin 12 volt relay-while retaining all of the early features or is it not possible?

I'm also open to using more modern relays (if two are needed) if there's a way to do it. I understand just enough to get myself into trouble but not quite enough to make this all work.

Most of what I've read in the forums concedes that functions will be lost and those people in the past have been okay with lost functionality. I would like to retain functionality if possible.

Or can I just leave the 6 volt relay in place? I'd guess it won't last long but who knows?

Sun Sep 07, 2014 8:35 am

For what it's worth, my 66 Bug was converted to 12 volts before I bought it, but they never changed the headlight relay. I drove that car for 16 years with a 6 volt relay, and used the headlights (high and low beam) every day, as it's dark when I go to work. Never had a problem.

Sun Sep 07, 2014 8:40 am

Donnie strickland wrote: For what it's worth, my 66 Bug was converted to 12 volts before I bought it, but they never changed the headlight relay. I drove that car for 16 years with a 6 volt relay, and used the headlights (high and low beam) every day, as it's dark when I go to work. Never had a problem.

If I can't find a 12 volt alternative I may just try that...a few people have mentioned that they've left it in place. The one bittersweet thing about VW Germany back in the day is that they over-engineered just about everything.

Sun Sep 07, 2014 5:07 pm

6v Relay has worked without any issues.