Ok so yesterday my truck stopped getting charge so I stated testing different things. I don't know if this has to do with the no charge but I found out with just the positive wire that goes to the glow relay, I then have power on the opposite side of that relay, on the opposite side of the relay of the firewall, on the negative battery cable, and even on the fuel filter housing. No fuses have blown. And I can't find any obvious shorts. Can anybody point me in the right direction. I have personally seen 4 of these 80's fords burn because of wiring issues and I don't want to see a fifth.
Electrical problems.
- Thread starter S-west
- Start date
This may sound odd..... but since you did run the batteries down. One thing it would do is, remove the battery cables from both batteries. Then take a voltmeter, and check the voltage and POLARITY.. When working on E-2, Trav and I were seeing all kinds of weird things going on in the electrical system. When we would hook up the charge line to the alt, it was acting like a short. After a bit of troubleshooting, we had discovered when the batteries got low, one reversed polarity. What we had happening was the drivers side battery was fine, and was pos to pos, and neg to neg. But the passenger side battery had reversed polarity and was pos to neg, and neg to pos. Only way we found it was checking voltage, and we were using a dvom andf it read -12v with the pos lead on the pos terminal, and the neg lead on the neg terminal...... That was a strange one, and took a bit to find.
rhkcommander
Full Access Member
Bad alternator?
I read through it all. Basically gleaned that the batts arent being charged. When mine failed it would charge them sometimes. But it was 50/50....
I read through it all. Basically gleaned that the batts arent being charged. When mine failed it would charge them sometimes. But it was 50/50....
Well that could be but I'm trying to figure out this wiring problem first. Traced the short to the wire coming off the stater solinoid that said fusible link that goes toward the alternator. But with the alternator unplugged there is still a draw
rhkcommander
Full Access Member
How old are the starter and glowplug relays? They can fail open or closed and could be sending power out when shouldnt be.
They dont always fail completely. IIRC the internals of these relays is a contact and a spinning disk? The high amperage draws damage them after time. Might only let some power through when its supposed to be off.
Another common short is the glow plug harness and the plastic connectors that join the harness to the other wiring on passenger side. Ive seen cable insulation rotted off, glow plug connectors sitting against the head, cracked plastic or corrosion jumping from the always hot glow plug relay wires (i wanna say they are yellow or brown... They are the two really fat wires either way)
Im on phone so sorry if im vague or whatever. Where are you located?
They dont always fail completely. IIRC the internals of these relays is a contact and a spinning disk? The high amperage draws damage them after time. Might only let some power through when its supposed to be off.
Another common short is the glow plug harness and the plastic connectors that join the harness to the other wiring on passenger side. Ive seen cable insulation rotted off, glow plug connectors sitting against the head, cracked plastic or corrosion jumping from the always hot glow plug relay wires (i wanna say they are yellow or brown... They are the two really fat wires either way)
Im on phone so sorry if im vague or whatever. Where are you located?
I checked those first. All good
rhkcommander
Full Access Member
I added some info above via editing.
"with just the positive wire that goes to the glow relay, I then have power on the opposite side of that relay, on the opposite side of the relay of the firewall, on the negative battery cable, and even on the fuel filter housing."
So are the glowplugs getting power? Try unplugging the starter power cable and relay wire, run the two glowplug power wires straight to the pos on batt. See if you still have power to ground. If so and everything else is unhooked its in the glowplug wiring/relay/controller.
If it goes cold, starter is probably shot and shorting internally. Either the solenoid or the main power terminal.
"with just the positive wire that goes to the glow relay, I then have power on the opposite side of that relay, on the opposite side of the relay of the firewall, on the negative battery cable, and even on the fuel filter housing."
So are the glowplugs getting power? Try unplugging the starter power cable and relay wire, run the two glowplug power wires straight to the pos on batt. See if you still have power to ground. If so and everything else is unhooked its in the glowplug wiring/relay/controller.
If it goes cold, starter is probably shot and shorting internally. Either the solenoid or the main power terminal.
pwjackson
Full Access Member
Check the gray connector plug on the passenger side of the truck, there is usually a yellow and green wire about 10awg in size. That connector was all corroded on the in side and melted on my truck when it died. I had power to my dome light and that was it, nothing else worked. Truck would not turn over nothing. I removed that connector and put some new disconnects in there and BAM everything working great with no issues.
There are also wire that have fusable links going to that connector.
There are also wire that have fusable links going to that connector.
Ya the glow plugs still work. Its not in the glow relay at all. I checked that then ended up tracing it through the starter solinoid and too the plug with the yellow and green wires here
Now I have to trace it into the wiring harness. That big yellow wire in the plug comes from the alternator and the small green wire comes from the voltage regulator. The large yellow wire then splits on the opposite side of the plug and turns into a yellow, and a black with orange tracer before entering the harness. That small yellow wire with a red tracer goes into the harness as is. Thanks for the input btw
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Now I have to trace it into the wiring harness. That big yellow wire in the plug comes from the alternator and the small green wire comes from the voltage regulator. The large yellow wire then splits on the opposite side of the plug and turns into a yellow, and a black with orange tracer before entering the harness. That small yellow wire with a red tracer goes into the harness as is. Thanks for the input btw
79jasper
Chickenhawk
Bad connections can cause weird problems. Especially grounds.
