If you are unfortunate enough to burn up the turn signal element in your BMW 2002, you can count on your friendly dealer to turn $30 into lunch money in a matter of seconds. On the other hand, if you only had lunch money to begin with you can drop into the nearest discount store’s automotive department and buy a unit made for a 1969 Chevrolet and still have enough left over for lunch.

The BMW unit is a four-terminal affair with a three-transistor timing circuit, two relays and enough other parts to build a small stereo. By removing all four leads and attaching the right two to the terminals of the Chevrolet unit you will be back in business in short order. One terminal has two green-yellow leads. Connect this terminal to one side of the Chevrolet unit. Another terminal has a blue-green, and this should be connected to the other side of the unit. Since the GM unit is a bimetallic strip it doesn’t care which lead is which. The two remaining leads should be taped out of the way as they will not be needed. The only difference you will notice in operation of the flashers is that the emergency switch will make the flashers operate at a faster rate. In normal turn signal use, they will operate at about the original rate.

Author: R.F. Tokarz