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Sleazyboii

Help - Random hyperflashing!

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Evening, really hoping someone can shine some knowledge on this as I’m at abit of a loss. 
 

So I’ve been running a full LED setup on my external lights for at least a year now without a single issue. 

Vland front lights

Valenti side indicators 

Valenti Tail lights. 
 

Recently I’ve upgraded the rears to a pair of Vland facelift / 2017+ taillights. Did a little test drive no issues, until later on that evening when I kept getting random occurrences of hyperflashing when indicating. I mean random as in I could be going down the road indicating it would hyperflashing and then stop or be sitting at the lights and it would hyperflash then go back to the normal pulse. 
 

I had a Google round not much info, other than sounds like a poor earth. Done some testing everything appears normal, wiring appears fine on the taillights and around the car and there’s been no changes elsewhere. 
 

Started to tat, I’ve noticed that if the ignition is on and when the indicator is in position right / left the front indicators fail to work and the rest of the car does. I then unplugged the rears thinking perhaps the rears are drawing too much current. They still didn’t come on.  Why does the car do this? 
 

Then started the car, with the rears unplugged and the fronts didn’t work until I plugged the rears back in. Again, is this to be expected? 
 

I guess what I’m after is what the hell is going on with this random hyperflashing? 
And any understanding to how the wiring works etc. 
I’m an absolute novice when it comes to car electrics. Any info would be helpful. 

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I would say if it worked before you changed the rear lights, that there maybe a fault with circuit board on those lights. I’ve not tried unplugging the rears before but I’ve unplugged the side bumper indicators and it doesn’t affect the flash speed at all. Mine is a 2017 facelift so may have a different flasher unit as it’s designed with led bulbs as standard. 

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I’ve purchased an LED flasher unit, which should be with me at some point, I’m hoping that replacing that will be the fix. I’m quite sure the indicator relay is load sensitive and perhaps for some reason when indicating and driving something is causing the load to change and this to hyper flash. 

its a given that the rear lights are causing some fault
 

I think for me just getting a better understanding of the way the lighting system works might be a help. 

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11 hours ago, Luke said:

I would say if it worked before you changed the rear lights, that there maybe a fault with circuit board on those lights. I’ve not tried unplugging the rears before but I’ve unplugged the side bumper indicators and it doesn’t affect the flash speed at all. Mine is a 2017 facelift so may have a different flasher unit as it’s designed with led bulbs as standard. 

The side indicators are low wattage so have very little impact on hyperflash - I'm not even sure if they are on the detector circuit.

8 hours ago, Sleazyboii said:

I’ve purchased an LED flasher unit, which should be with me at some point, I’m hoping that replacing that will be the fix. I’m quite sure the indicator relay is load sensitive and perhaps for some reason when indicating and driving something is causing the load to change and this to hyper flash. 

its a given that the rear lights are causing some fault
 

I think for me just getting a better understanding of the way the lighting system works might be a help. 

So you're on the OEM flasher relay? If so, this has a resistor that determines the resistance that causes hyperflash. Some of the aftermarket flasher relays have a longer 1st flash, that really annoyed me, so I changed the relay. By doing this, I learnt a few things. As LEDs draw less current, you will get hyperflash as the comparison of the resistance vs the relay means that it picks up what it thinks is a failed bulb and hyperflashes. I also found that when one of my lights failed, verified as a short in the unit, that side would not function at all as I guess the resistance was so low that it couldn't function. I think that by removing the rear lights, this is also what you're simulating. Even hazards wouldn't work. An aftermarket LED flasher will lose blown bulb detection as it just outputs a signal no matter what but should work without issue

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Thanks for the response. 
 

Yep, I’m still on the oem flasher relay.  I’m hoping mine doesn’t have the same initial long flash, judging by the looks of them they’re all the same. It would annoy me also. When you say changed the relay what did you change it to? 
 

I understand to a degree how the flasher relay works and that this one is load sensitive. My confusion is why it hyper flashes randomly and the car can go several indications without doing it then randomly come on. 
 

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On 7/10/2021 at 12:49 AM, Sleazyboii said:

Thanks for the response. 
 

Yep, I’m still on the oem flasher relay.  I’m hoping mine doesn’t have the same initial long flash, judging by the looks of them they’re all the same. It would annoy me also. When you say changed the relay what did you change it to? 
 

I understand to a degree how the flasher relay works and that this one is load sensitive. My confusion is why it hyper flashes randomly and the car can go several indications without doing it then randomly come on. 
 

I meant changed the resistor in the OEM relay, I did this twice as I first put LEDs in the OEM front and rear lights, and then swapped to VLAND rears, which needed to change the resistors to work at all. Means you get the better OEM flash pattern. All the ones on eBay are the same, you might find the Valenti, TapTurn or other more expensive ones don't do this.

https://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=114284

The random activity will be down to the system voltage and resistance. Possibly if the alternator is providing more than 12v and whether the LED resistance changes as they heat up under use. It must be right on a threshold.

 

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Thanks for sending that link. I’ll see how well the led flasher works, failing that I’m going to be modifying mine. 
 

I think it must be as I managed to do some road testing on the weekend the car would hyper flash when driving as soon as I was at a standstill it would stop. Dead strange. 

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