Drove home in my '66 LeSabre and stopped of to buy some masking tape. Got back in the car outside the paintstore and turned the key - nothing. Just plain dead. Now I got one of those fancy batteries with a status indicator so I popped the hood and the indicator is a nice bright green. I got nothing, no dome lights, no dash lights, no parking lights. The main feed seems to be fine. There looks to be power at the fuse box. WTF? Is this something anyones come across before or am I on my own here?
check the fuseable links down near the starter. there should be 2. one for the electrical system (gauges, brake lights interior lights radio) the other for the headlights. (do the headlights still work?) check to make sure you have good contact between the posts of the battery and cables. if possable check to see what the voltage is of the battery. then turn something like the headlights on (even if they dont work) and check the voltage again) Nate
Thanks. Theres no headlights, no dome light, no nothing. I have 12.9V on the battery and its "condition monitor" is strong bright green. There appears to be power at the fuse box (the auto recovery guy checked that) It just went dead. Before it died I got this thing where when I touched the brakes or the signals the radio would cut out for like a second (power off, power on) it was like this about 2 miles then I stopped, bought some tape, got in the car, and nothing.
Thanks tlivingd, not a million miles from what happened... In case anyone else has this problem and finds this thread searching - It was the nut that holds the big fat power cables onto the starter motor. It had come loose. The main feed to the starter was fine, but where it splits to go to the main electrics etc. it was about hanging off. This is all hidden under the passenger side exhaust on a 340. Back on the road now.
Well, props go to Mr Peter Armstrong. He's my local auto electrician in a van. I called him on the wednesday from work, he comes to my house thursday after work (about 5:30 pm) and starts to work. He fixes the main problem but we have another, the car now won't turn off. I thought it was ignition switch failure but when you turn it off everything goes dead except the engine which runs and runs like a good 'un. Peter traced the fault to a short at the balast restistor or something. Fixed it. I had mentioned "if you get time" my Sport Fury isn't charging, so he goes through that, finds a bad earth on the alternator's off-board control box, fixed that. its now just gone 7 pm and he charges me 36 (About $50 US Dollars) for the whole lot. OK, no parts used, but callout plus 90 minutes labour? hes a cool guy. Fixed my wife's Mini headlight fault I couldn't in 30 minutes one time for 25 ($35 US) inc. and did that about 7pm one night as I needed it done fast because we got a ticket for headlight out. All I had to do was keep the hot strong tea flowing (2 sugar, not to much milk)
