73' challenger rear tailight socket ?

[71383bee]

I think I know the answer to this but here goes.  I was wondering if the socket grounds through its insertion into the taillight housing or are they individually grounded through a wire? 

I'm trying to troubleshoot my right rear taillight from no longer functioning.  Parking lights work but the turn/stop/flasher no longer functions.  I did the easy thing first and switched bulbs to no avail.  I checked with a test light and both of the wire contacts had power when their function was on.  Just not when a bulb was inserted.  I noticed that there were 3 wires going to the socket and am assuming one is ground but wanted to confirm. 

I stopped at a parts store and got a universal 1157 style bulb socket from the HELP section.  I was wondering if i need to use the ground in the wiring harness or if i could just run a small jumper from the socket to a post somewhere in the trunk. 

[JS29]

You say that with a test light, you have proper power. Do all three wires show power? You could place a jumper wire to act as a ground on the housing, and see if that helps. I don't have much experience with 72-74 models, 70-71 do ground to the body. Hope this helps.                                                                                   Mark.

[71383bee]

OK...i figured it out. It was both a grounding and poor wiring issue. 

So I confirmed that you were correct that the ground is between the socket and the taillight housing.  What caught me was a third wire going from a metal tab on the socket back into the wiring harness.  That led me to believe that there may have been a shared ground for the taillight system similar to 71/72 B bodies.  What the FSM showed and some digging is that it is the opposite.  The ground wire serves as the ground for the rear right side marker light.  So after some wire brushing and sanding of the socket and the housing I resolved that.

However, the lights were still intermittent and I found 2 splices in the original wiring harness with very poor twisted and electrical taped splices.  What was curious was that only the two turn and parking light wires were cut and spliced and not the third ground wire which was to the stock harness and stock socket.  Weird that only those 2 were cut.  So anyways I cleaned up the wires and used crimped butt splice connectors with some clean tape and we're back in business.  Eventually Ill likely get a replacement harness as this one has seen better days but I'm not in a hurry to pull half the interior and run a new harness so the stock job will need to get me by for now. 

Thanks for the help!