One more light, a bunch more problems...

Today in a spare moment I decided to change one of my lower amber marker lights. Did I say spare moment? Silly me as I meant a spare couple of hours or rather, they weren't actually spare but it took a couple of hours to complete a 20 minute job.

The first problem was found when I enlarged the right-hand screw hole. That turned out to be at an angle (Does it really surprise anybody that Carpenter gave up bus manufacturing) which had the knock-on effect of forcing me to move the whole marker light half an inch to the right - closer to the front of the bus. Having done that I could install my 8-32 rivnuts with no problem.

Then I discovered the big hole that Carpenter made for the wires was so off-center that I had to file it out on the right. Cue some more cursing! Eventually having moved the light position I was left with a hole on the far left that needed filling. That I drilled out and put a rivet in. Of course I was using a hand riveter and that rivet - which I'd thought was aluminium - turned out to be steel so it was quite a challenge to get the rivet in using that little Harbor Freight hand riveter. I managed it though.

Checking the wires with a multimeter there was way less resistance than I would have expected. Once the new light was connected and powered up, it lit as well as expected, proving meter readings can be worthless.

Still, at the end I had a much nicer looking, much brighter new marker light. I did start work on the marker light the other side....

That is where I stopped for the day however. Both of the screw heads are crumbling. That means I will have to cut the wire on the light unit, tear the plastic to shreds and undo the screws with a pair of pliers. Then it will be a case of removing the aluminium bracket, prepping and working it as the last light. I just hope Carpenter got the light in a better place this time!

I have to say Carpenter's workmanship has been extremely questionable. They went bust in 2005, 11 years after this bus rolled out of their factory. There are areas where the steel has just been bashed into place with a hammer and it shows. It doesn't harm structural integrity but it does look a bit strange.