Michael Benno

Here is a curious question.

The tail lights on my USA spec 1988 S4 don’t seem to wired as per the owners manual. The owners manual clearly identifies the bulbs in the lower outer and middle positions as tail lights and species the OSRAM 5007 single filament bulb. The inner most bottom light acts as a tail light and brake light. The bulb is specified as OSRAM 7528 dual filament bulb. This aligns with information I have seen in posts on the forum.






However, when I inspected my taillights, the the socket for the dual filament bulb was on the outermost position and the innermost position was set up for a single filament. The wiring and the housing looks unmodified. The innermost light acts as a brake, but does not illuminate with headlights.

FLYVMO

It is setup as the ROW light. Only the two outer lower lights are tail lights on ROW cars. Inner light is brake light only. On ROW cars the outer lower is a dual filament and is both tail light and rear fog light as well.

In my opinion, that is a better setup. Combined tail/brake light is not a good idea in general.

Cheers!
Carl

Michael Benno

Thanks for the tip, you are correct, I looked up the Euro manual (ROW) and was able to verify the tail lights on my car are ROW configuration. Here is a comparison for those who are interested:


This is the euro (ROW) wiring configuration.


This is the USA configuration.



This is from the Euro Owners Manual
Blinker Light: 21Watt Single Filament (A in ROW pic)
Reverse Light: 21Watt Single Filament (B in ROW pic)
Rear Fog + Tail Light: 21/4 Watts Twin filament (C/D in ROW pic)
Back Light: 21Watt Single Filament (D in ROW pic)
Brake Light: 21Watt Single Filament (E in ROW pic)