Troubleshooting Shame

So I feel sorta dumb, but also not dumb.

Lemme Explain.

a month ago or so I noticed one of my tail lights was burnt out (not bad considering I have 120k miles on the bike) so I pulled it out and took it to my local shop. I handed the parts guy the bulb and asked for 2 new ones.

He brought back a different part number, claiming it was the same as what I gave him. I trusted the guy, bought 2 bulbs. I installed them and noticed an issue with the rear brake not activating the brake lights, but fixed it by adjusting the thread on the little switch.

Lights worked fine for 2 weeks, then I noticed that the running lights stopped working. Only the brake lamps worked. The next day I noticed I had no brake lights at all.

I messed with the switches, double checked all the wiring, could not find anything wrong.

We have small kids and my wife was getting impatient with me being outside working on the bike, so I threw in the towel and dropped it off at the shop where I bought the bulbs from on Saturday.

I agreed to the inspection fee.

They called me up and said the bulbs were the culprit, they were 6 volt instead of 12 volt, or something like that..... I was seriously irritated. They sold me those stupid bulbs.

They gave me the new bulbs for free and cut the price of repair down a bit. I am just irritated at myself for not testing with my old bulb I kept that was not burnt out....

I am not mad for paying for the work, it was my decision to stop troubleshooting it myself (well, my wife's decision... lol), plus they found something wrong with the way the rear axle was mounted, so they did do one more thing on top of the bulb replacement.

You ever do some troubleshooting and run into a wall and then someone else looks at it and finds a simple solution?
 
Yes, it happens all the time. That's why it's handy to have a buddy to wrench/work on things with you. Sometimes having another set of eyes/ears/hands can point out the obvious that you're missing.
 
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