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Two weeks ago Tom Manteufel was kind enough to mention to me that my brake lights were not working. Last week I took a moment to check my switches and found that they had both failed. This came as a bit of a surprise since I had just replaced one a year ago and the other was a 25 year old original. I replaced both with the same kind of Brazilian replacement that had failed after only a year. Since I now had two bad switches of different kinds, I decided to cut them apart and see if there were any differences in construction that might explain the early failure of the Brazialian one. These were the late, 3-pin variety. I found the OE switch, made by Mera, to be of excellent quality inside. In fact I really can't tell why it failed to make contact. The Brazilian switch came in a red, white and blue box marked "Olympic" and has a white plastic insulator between the three pins. There are no brand markings on the switch itself. The construction of this switch is is notably inferior. This switch failed when the nylon plunger that actuates the contacts melted. Heating at this point would be common if the brake pedal is just being held lightly so there was not really good contact, and hence some power dissipation, at the contacts. I will try to avoid these switches in the future. This plunger is made of steel in the German Mera switches. I also have some different Brazilian switches of a brand "3-RHO." These have a black plastic insulator for the three pins, and this insulator looks like it might be of a better, higher temp material than the "Olympic" brand. I have not taken one apart so I can only speculate on its internal construction. I can hope that they are better. Now for my questions. Has anyone else done any inspections like this, and could you share your results with me? Does anyone know if the "3-RHO" brand is good or not? Does anyone know were one can buy the OE "Mera" brand at a reasonable price? Obviously if the Brazilian ones fail every year then the Mera ones would be worth a premium, if only for the peace of mind. Finally, if anyone has some old failed switches of any brand other than Mera or Olympic, would you be willing to ship them to me? I, in return, would cut them apart and share my observations with the list. So far I am rather convinced that I will never throw away a working OE switch no matter how old it is. Jim - ******************************* Jim Adney, jadney@vwtype3.org Madison, Wisconsin, USA ******************************* ------------------------------------------------------------------- List info at http://www.vwtype3.org/list or mailto:help@vwtype3.org