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Squarebird headlight switches are straight-forward switches. Later, Ford removed the fuse holders from the back and incorporated self-resetting circuit breakers. - Dave
Interesting . . . . so when one of us is driving along and pulls the headlight switch out, all amperage needed by 4 headlights, the tailights and the instrument lights is passing through a single contact.
That's right, John... and in the 6-volt days, the headlight switch passed TWICE the current. Now, start adding trailer lights.
These contacts aren't lightweight. They last forever, too. Key switches are the same... HEAVY DUTY.
Even so, it's easy to see why modern cars use relays. They save money! Sometimes we get caught up trying to save so much money, iron-clad systems now fail to work... like those Japanese cars that wouldn't shut off. (Can you imagine?)
I like the engineering our Ford Founding Fathers had. The key switch NEVER failed to shut off our car. It might be 'cool' to press a button to start and stop an engine, but I will never have one. I like my ignition circuit running through a real manually-operated switch. - Dave
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