Odd Electrical Problem

[christiane]

I finally got the 6 bolt installed in my car. After taking it our for a test drive yesterday I parked it back in front of the garage so I could put the hood back on, the downpipe (damn it was fun driving the car with absolutely no exhaust on it at all ) as well as a few other little odds and ends. As I started the car up to pull it into the garage I hit the headlights when I did everything died. the car would not turn over at all. In fact none of the relays even engaged. The headlights do not come on, the interior lights to the gauges do not illuminate. The windows will not roll up. ECT. ECT. What would cause such a widespread system failure?
Thus far I have checked all of the fuses as well as the relays that I can readily access. When I attempt to turn the headlights on there is a clicking noise from the area where the headlamp relay is located. I swapped it with another relay from that panel and there was no change.

 

[toybreaker]

The positive battery terminal has several different connections on it. It's possible that they're dirty/corroded/loose. I have had a couple of weird electrical issues from intermittent contact of the individual wires connected to the terminal.

It's most definately worth your time to clean and tighten them, if only to eliminate them as a potential cause.

The ground cable to the body may also have come adrift. there should be two connections. One leg goes to the tranny, and one leg goes to the body. It may be one wire, and in that case the tranny ground hit's up the body along the way. Please be sure the body connection is clean and tight.

 

[christiane]

Perhaps I should have mentioned that I had relocated the battery to the hatch of the car. Is it necessary to ground the engine back to the body with the 4 ga wire that was connected at the tranny? I did have the car running after moving the battery to the hatch area.

 

[christiane]

Update:
It appears that the only power in the cabin of the car is the door switches. ALl of the controls on the steering column are not functioning. According to my multi-meter I am not getting power to any of the fuses inside the car. I have checked all of the fuses on the outside for breaks and they all appear to be fine.
I just dont understand how relocating the battery could cause all of these issues.

 

[toybreaker]

Remote batteries can introduce a few complications, but the wiring is basically the same.

You've probably attatched your positive feed wire from the rear to your o.e. positive wires where the positive battery terminal used to be. That works, just make sure everythings clean and tight and ISOLATED from ground....I'm thinking your problem is in this connection bundle. Individually clean each connection with fresh sandpaper, and don't stack more than four wires (or so) together.

When manufacturers do remote batteries, they use an isolated post in the engine compartment to provide a power source/location for systems to pull their power from. I'd go to the boneyard and scadge one from an audi or some such german car, and morph it into your system. It will provide an easy test point/access to 12v + in the engine compartment, and will tidy things up considerabally. It will also come with a cap/cover to prevent accidental weldage of tools and etc...to the chassis when you brush against it

There is a fuse/circuit breaker on the battery positive wire back at the battery, right? I've seen more than a few car-b-ques from unprotected rear mount batteries. It would flat suck to burn your car down....And it goes without saying that you've got your battery SECURELY mounted. The battery is very heavy, and will come loose in almost any front end accident, and it WILL hurt you/or catch the car on fire if it can touch anything...The plastic battery boxes/remote mounts from summit/jegs/etc are a cost effective way to put the battery out of harms way.

{takes off volunteer fire dept hat... }


Remote mounting the battery does complicate the ground path somewhat. There should be a ground strap at the rear of the car from battery negative straight to the chassis, hopefully to a clean stud/bolt etc....I've seen some really hokey field engineering here, WTF , Make SURE you've got a good ground location, and that it's clean, and to a non-painted, substantial piece of the car.

In the front of the car, there should be a large ground to the tranny area for a starter/engine ground. Most people reuse the original ground cable for this, and just connect the end that went to the battery negative to the chassis. That works. There should also be a few additional straps from the intake to the firewall, and the t-belt side motor mount to the fenderwell, etc...

A 4awg cable from the tranny to a good ground on the chassis will go along way to making things happy. You can add a few extra grounds to the alternator braket and the like, if it makes you feel better, I usually do.

If you run a powerfull stereo, you can't have too many grounds