So I was driving along, I made a quick left turn and all of a sudden the car died. I let it coast to a stop, attempted to restart it and it acted like the battery was dead.

Smoke started coming out of the hood at that point, so I popped the hood and found a smoking ground wire. (Green, attached to the firewall near the wiper motor). I looked at the battery, and apparently it had slid back and the positive terminal made contact with the body (left a nice scorch mark).

Long story short, battery is secured, but the car runs rough now. Car seems to stumble, and it feels like it surges even when the idle is held stable. It gets less obvious at higher RPMs. According the the voltage gauge, its running around 11-12V with the car running (well below the normal 13-14), so I my first guess is that there is a short somewhere, causing low voltage, causing the missing.

The only wires that appear burned up are the green ground wire mentioned, and a mystery wire coming from the firewall. It comes from a wire bundle behind the distributor, and goes to a 3 pin harness that goes to the canister behind the wiper motor (I can't figure out what that thing is, is it part of the wiper motor?). The burned mystery and ground appeared to be connected through some plastic sort of connector before the wire harness. The other two wires appear pink and yellow, but it doesn't appear to match anything in the wiring diagrams.

Random facts:
89 firebird, rebuilt 2.8L, AFAIK things like the distributor/wires/alternator/injectors are all new. Visually checked the spark plug wires, appear fine.

No codes are being thrown. The mystery wire is wrapped in electrical tape, so its not shorting into anything to my knowledge.

Question 1: Does this sound like a shorting problem to you guys?

Question 2: Does anyone have suggestions/guides to troubleshooting shorts? Obviously it has to be limited, since I would think anything bogging it down that much would blow a fuse.

Question 3: Does anyone know what that cylinder behind the wiper motor is? That seems to be the most obvious problem area.

I will get some photos up once the weather clears, and start checking easy things like the continuity in the spark wires.

I'd be happy to answer any questions/check anything.

Thanks for any help.

 

Update with some photos, sorry about them being so dim.

Here is the ground wire that burned up, my hand is sitting on the brake booster.

<table style="width:auto;"><tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/2Lcf3WnzPBDlgCk8HpqXuS8WEE22crUJ0Axy51cssxI?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/_qq2j_-NTYbw/S_KrzU17MuI/AAAAAAAACkk/NKxEaz1G8U8/s144/2010-05-18%2009.07.40.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td style="font-family:arial,sans-serif; font-size:11px; text-align:right">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/nahteecirp/DropBox?authkey=Gv1sRgCK3qw4fJlITTMQ&feat=embedwebsite">Drop Box</a></td></tr></table>

Here is the harness that the ground appeared to be connected to. The other burned wire is the one on the left. Canister in the background is the one I was referring to.

<table style="width:auto;"><tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/UQTNtc2tvXbXrKILZn0U8i8WEE22crUJ0Axy51cssxI?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_qq2j_-NTYbw/S_Kr7usgA0I/AAAAAAAACko/S5jqJ45unYs/s144/2010-05-18%2009.08.06.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td style="font-family:arial,sans-serif; font-size:11px; text-align:right">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/nahteecirp/DropBox?authkey=Gv1sRgCK3qw4fJlITTMQ&feat=embedwebsite">Drop Box</a></td></tr></table>

Battery was dead this morning (after starting up yesterday evening), so this seems to point to the short theory.

 

 

Well, the green wire is currently disconnected (I don't want to splice it back to the other wire until I know what it does obviously), but it doesn't seem to have directly affected anything.

I will get the alternator tested, see what they say.

What exactly do you mean scan for codes? I've got the fancy paperclip that flashes ECM codes with the SES light, but it just does the 1-2 pattern continuously. It sounds like it stores a list of previous codes or something?

Thanks for your help, and I rather like your post title =P

 

 

Problem appears to be fixed, yay.

Replaced the battery and alternator, car was still running rough. It ran okay when I first started it, but got progressively worse. Voltage was running down, so it obviously wasn't charging. Checked the wiring, turned out the body ground wire that comes off of the negative battery terminal had pulled off. Crimped on new connector, screwed it on, and now the car runs fine. Voltage meter reads 13-14 volts while running.

May have not needed the alternator, certainly didn't hurt though.

Thanks for the help all