I swapped out the rear hatch on my 88 firebird. It has the original power hatch pull down and it worked fine before the swap. The only item swapped from the other car was the hatch and 3rd brake light. After completing the swap I tested it and everything worked fine. The hatch pulled down, the 3rd brake light came on ... nice easy job, right?

I left the car sitting with the hatch opened up, car not running and was straightening up when all of a sudden smoke comes pouring out from the rear compartment where the latch assembly is. Turns out the relay on the hatch pull down harness started to cook and fried right there in the driveway.

But OH ... I'll just use the harness from the other parts car, right?! Wrong ... it didn't work. Maybe the top switch is bad on the parts car harness, so I clipped off the relay plugs and spliced them on my original switch harness ... didn't work. Now I can latch the hatch, but I can't get it to pull down and the 3rd brake light doesn't work either.

What caused this thing to fry all of a sudden when I had just seen it work after I finished installing the hatch? What could be the problem with it now? Did I fry more than just the relay? Is there a fuse somewhere that may have blown also?

PLEASE HELP!

 

Found the fuse ... replaced it ... figured it out ... works like a charm. YAY!