Electronics Need help wiring something up? Thinking of adding an electrical component to your car? Need help troubleshooting that wiring glitch?

Short, where to start looking

Old 12-09-2000, 04:11 PM
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Short, where to start looking

I have a short somewhere in my car, I had my battery, altanator and even my starter tested and there all good. So I am sure that it is a short, but where do I start looking? I know that the guy who owned the car befor I did put a new cd player in it so could he of not wired it right? If I let the car sit over night it will have enough power to run the lights and thats about it in the morning.
Old 12-10-2000, 01:33 AM
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Car: 91 camaro
Engine: 383
Transmission: T56
Ok, this may be a dumb idea and kinda tedious, and I'm not even sure if it'll work, but here's what I'd try: when the battery is charged up, and the negative cable is disconnected, touch the cable to the negative post. You see a small spark, right? That spark means that something is drawing power. Then go and unplug all the fuses. Put one of them back in. Then touch the negative wire to the post. Does it spark? If it does, then something that runs through that fuse is drawing power. Continue this process for each fuse. Most of them shouldn't spark since there shouldn't be anyting drawing power when the car's not running (with the exception of the hood light, and a small amount of current for the CD player and the ECM memory). This way you can begin to isolate what system the short is in by seeing which fuse it is run through. Then find out what components that fuse has power to. Uh, if you take out all the fuses, and it still sparks, then obviously I have no idea what I'm talking about here, and you might not want to waste your time trying this. Oh, yeah, you also might want to make note of where all the fuses go, I know they're labeled and all, but just in case...
Old 12-11-2000, 05:30 PM
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Do what Vicious said, But use a multimeter

Test for Continuity between the Negative post and the Chassis with the Negative cable disconnected, Alot More accurate Than the Spark method

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Old 12-13-2000, 07:09 AM
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Do a search for the text "battery drain" in the electronics section. There are 12 topics existing that discuss this problem.

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