so i'm having problems with battery draining through the arc fuse. i've check all the wiring off of my radio and i believe it's the only thing possible that could be causing the problem. i've never had a problem until i installed my new eclipse radio.

any idea what to check with the wiring to solve this issue?

 

Have you put an DMM on it yet?

 

Pull the fuse to the radio and see if it stops.

 

i did pull the fuse and it does. that's the problem, i'm trying to figure out what with the radio could cause it.

 

How much current is it pulling: when on, when off, when the car is off? Which fuse did you pull, was it the one in the radio, or the radio fuse in the fuse box?

 

How long are you leaving it? Do you have the esn light blinking 24/7? ..happens when i let mine sit too, but when i drive it consistantly, it's fine.

 

for some reason, when my deck was wired crappy (for testing purposes, with solder and tape,) I blew the ARC fuse several times... I rewired the deck and it never happened again...

what the heck is the ARC fuse anyhow?

 

as far as i know it's only for the memory retention of the clock/stereo section. i do not know the votlage as i've only tested it with a test light but with the car off the test light lights up very bright and when i pull the fuse it goes out.

if i were to let the car sit for a few days it dies... i usually drive it only on the weekends lately. pulled the fuse and all is well. i need to check the wiring of the radio. i had someone else do it which was my first mistake.

 

You bout the 2din new unit they got witn the nav built in? ... i dunno if it has the esn light bt i do know you can usually turn them off....if u dont have it all programmed yet, remove the constant wire for the memory, and see if it still happens

 

kandied... I think the stereo keeps it's memory from the main power wire... which is always on... under "radio" I believe it's 10amps... I don't believe there are any other wires that go to the radio, other than accessory.

if you pull the fuse, does your radio stop working?

honestly, I'd say re-wire your entire radio... when mine was blowing the ARC fuse, I couldn't figure out why, so I re-wired... never had a problem since..

 

I just checked the schematics for the radio to fuseblock. The RADIO fuse is 10A and powers the radio via a switched +12V yellow wire. The ARC fuse is a constant +12V 20A and is an orange wire running to the radio. Seems kind of a high rating for a radio. The factory audio amp runs off of a different 20A circuit so that has nothing to do with it.

 

where does the orange wire actually run to, the wiring harness? because I don't think it's used for anything. Maybe the cigarette lighter?

 

I just did a quick but relatively thorough check of the schematics for the entire car for all engine options in the 91 Camaro and I see that orange ARC wire going to the radio harness and no where else. Everything else that you'd expect to draw a lot of power is running off of the ACC or PWR ACC fuses. Strange...

 

Well I know that the radio will not run off of the ARC fuse alone... needs the radio fuse or it won't run... and lose the station memory... maybe the ARC wire was for a stock radio somehow?

 

How many orange wires are there? My orange wire kept shorting to ground and blowing fuses- it ended up being the dimmer control for when the lights turn on.

 

as far as I know, the orange wire is just illumination-to-stereo.

 

Here is my (rather crudely) edited schematic:

 

And here's the rest...

 

I'd recommend for further testing, pull the ARC fuse, disconnect the +12V CONST wire on the head from the factory wiring harness and power the head from some other constant unswitched power in the car. I have a feeling that either the radio is improperly wired; in which case the battery will continue to be drained even through a different fuse...OR the battery will hold its charge; which points to a short somewhere along the orange wire connecting the ARC fuse to the radio's +12V CONST wire.

As a quick test: disconnect the positive terminal at the battery and run a resistance check from the ARC fuse to ground. If you pull anything lower than in the Megohm range or higher then you definitely do have a short somewhere on the orange wire after the ARC fuse.

Just to avoid any confusion before it starts, check this page:
http://www.carstereo.com/help/carwires.cfm

All of us who've done installs are used to seeing a red +12V constant wire for our radios as this is the standard, but the GM constant wire in the harness is actually orange; which is the ARC wire. The orange that we are used to seeing is the industry standard color for the dimmer/illumination, which is grey on these cars in the harness.

 

well if you use the aftermarket adapter harness, constant 12v should be yellow, assuming you don't cut into the original harness, it shouldn't matter what the original colors were.