I have replied separately to Pete S, but must put in my dissenting remarks
about Lucas electrics. I have owned British cars since 1960, and have yet to
be let down by the Prince of Darkness, despite the reputation, and the many
stories told by others. I suppose it does help to be an electrical engineer by
profession, but other than for basic routine maintenance to electrical
components, I don't spend extra time on electrics. It does help, however, to
understand the logic of electricity, which seems to escape some otherwise very
bright people.
I have bought several cars which had electrical problems, in some cases stated
by the previous owners, and most of the time have found out that a previous
owner or maintainer had "modified" the wiring in some way. In one case I
removed the complete harness, opened it up to remove and replace the various
hacked and modified/missing wiring, and replaced it to find that everything
worked correctly again. Jon's complaint about the dash light switch is
typical. In a correctly wired car, with the correct switches, what he says he
has never been able to do is a standard feature. Of course you can put on the
dash lights (and the parking lights) without putting on the headlights, that
is what the centre position of the lighting switch is for. In another car I
found that a PO had done some work on behind the dash components, but had
reconnected various wires incorrectly, with the result that some functions no
longer worked. I am occasionally asked to help a friend (any brand car) sort
out some electrical problem or other, and am amazed at how frequently I find
an absolute horror story of hacked and or dangerous wiring.
I firmly believe that most of the "difficult to resolve" electrical problems
we encounter with our Lucas equipped cars are the result of modifications of
one sort or another done by previous keen but not electrically savvy owners
(and occasionally garage help). Lucas design philosophy was consistently
conservative, but in keeping with most other manufacturers of the time. We
all know they provided the minimum number of fuses they could get away with,
and which by todays standards we consider to be inadequate. Nonetheless, with
a minimum of maintenance, we can ensure that these old systems conrtinue to
operate as they were designed to do. There are lots of problems caused by
component failure in older cars, but that is where more serious routine
maintenance comes in.
Just my 2 cents
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