Rear brake light problem

The left rear brake light is out on my 96 850 wagon. The bulbs checked out
fine, tried new ones, still nothing.
Check the fuses just to be sure, nothing. The dash warning light comes on
as I brake, so that's still working. Just the brake light. The turn signal
light above it works just fine.

Can anyone shed some light on what may be the problem.?

Thanks in advance,
Mike

 

Tucked into the left frame rail at the back is the rear bulb failure
relay. There's one wire from the brake light switch going into it, and
one wire for each (3) brake light coming out of it. On my '98s the wire
going in is yellow, out to left is yellow-gray, right is yellow-brown
and center is gray-black. Or look at the terminal numbers on the relay
itself - in is 54, out are 54L, 54R and 54H. This relay can suffer from
bad solder joints, just like every other Volvo relay.

 

Mike,

Thanks for the tip! I actually found this relay after taking the rear cargo
area apart yesterday. For some reason the relay box was slightly unplugged
which was the cause of the problem.

Mike