Okay, not quite a fire, but enough melted plastic that I'm wondering what the fuse box is good for (it never burned a fuse). In the engine bay, against the firewall, just passenger side of the HEI, is a 4-wire connection. Two dark green wires, one light green wire, and what's left of a black wire. My Chilton's says those are air conditioning wires. Now what would make that black wire fry so badly, but not blow a fuse? A little background: recently recharged the a/c system after 4 years of no a/c. Another post said something about a bad a/c bearing caused an electrical problem? Is that possible?

Another problem is that even though I unplugged that four-wire connection, I still smell melting wire when I drive around. Where do these wires go?

 

Sometimes when a fuse blows someone will replace it with a higher fuse. That can definatly cause wires to fry.