i wanted to get opinions before a pull the ignition switch. I've had problems with what started with getting power to just the fuel pump. id turn key and pump wouldnt come on sometimes. after cycling keys a few times pump would prime. fuse was good. i replaced relay and thought it was fixed and pump cut off while driving. I replaced the whole Aeromotive fuel pump hanger and thought it was fixed and after maybe 10 mins of idle i lost power to everything. cycled keys a few times and power finally came back. im being led to believe its ignition switch. ill post pics of what i think is the ignition switch. i need someone to confirm and 2nd mine doesn't look anything like what im seeing for replacements

 

Yes that is the ign sw. Looks just like they always do. Replacement ones don't necessarily look exactly like that butt they'll have the same flange thing for mounting, the same place for the rod to poke the moving contacts, the same connector layout for the wires, etc.

Butt don't get all wound up about that just yet.

There are any number of things in the car that DON'T pass through the ign sw. In a nutshell, everything that runs off of hard battery (headlights, interior lights, brake lights, tail lights, hatch popper, ...) CANNOT be disabled by ANYTHING to do with the ign sw, up to and including completely removing it. So, if ANY of those things are involved in "lost power to everything", then the ign sw CANNOT be the cause of that.

Note that I am NOT saying "your ign sw is good"; NOT saying "there's nothing wrong with your ign sw"; NOT saying "don't replace your ign sw"; NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT. So all of you keyboard warriors out there, DO NOT accuse me of telling him any of those things. All I'm saying is, "lost power to everything" CANNOT be caused by the ign sw, if "everything" includes things that DON'T go through the ign sw at all, and that "lost power to everything" is thus caused by something else.

Suspect a bad connection somewhere. Start at the batt itself; remove both cables, clean both the cable ends and the batt terminals with baking soda and hot water and a wire brush. Check the cables themselves; loose connections at the ends opposite the batt (block ground and big post on the starter) or loose "improvements" to the batt terminal ends for example. Then, the source of batt toward the rest of the car, which is, the big post on the starter where the batt cable connects. THE WHOLE CAR gets its batt from that point, through the fusible links, which can be bad themselves or merely have bad connections. Then, the terminals of C100 where batt goes through; there are 2 most likely, and if the connectors are corroded or loose or whatever, they can become intermittent. Fortunately those will almost always be highly obvious, because they will generate heat, LOTS of it, and the wire will become brown or even black on both sides (engine and interior) if they go bad.

 

its possible it is the battery itself. it reads 13.5 volts when running. about 12.8 sitting. its a duel post battery. the top posts have a vacuum canister, alternator, and fuel pump running to it. the rest of car im guessing runs through front post. i initial thought it was battery connection or relay when it was just fuel pump but when the whole car cut off i lost power to everything. windows, instrument cluster, lights. it came back a few minutes later though. when it was just the fuel pump i could cycle the keys a few times and eventually get it going. maybe the battery posts are messed up inside battery? i did check the battery's ground wire. looks solid. cars got a mini starter. normally when the cable comes loose on it, it only effects the starter itself on this car

 

Doesn't matter. You're looking for an intermittent bad connection between the batt and the car, not steady-state charging performance.

Time to figure that out FOR SURE so you don't have to "guess" anymore. Kinda hard to troubleshoot something when you don't know what it is to begin with.

Doesn't matter. One way or another, THE WHOLE CAR has to connect to the battery; and the way it came from the factory was, the + batt cable goes to the big post on the starter, and since electrically that's arbitrarily close to the same point as the + batt terminal itself, THE WHOLE CAR gets its power from that spot, via the fusible links.

Normally the cable needs to stop coming loose. That right there might well be The Whole Problem. If the cable comes loose regularly then it needs work.

Sounds altogether like this car has suffered too many "improvements" to its unfortunate electrical system. Once whatever is broken has been fixed, might be worthwhile to examine each of those "improvements", determine whether they're necessary let alone beneficial, and unless you're an electrical engineer (sounds unlikely butt I figured I'd throw that in), put it back like the factory - somebody that KNEW WHAT THEY WERE DOING, whether or not it accommodated any subsequent modernization - designed it and built it.

 

the blade type connection to the switch is the one that kept sliding loose in past, its currently hooked up. when it pops loose the only thing that doesn't work is the starter itself. when it was just the fuel pump id turn the key and pump wouldn't come on. when i did get it to crank, id drive it a few miles and the engine would cut off. gauges and fans all still had power. but after cycling the keys a few times it would magically crank and run long enough to get home. the last time, everything cut out associated with electronics so its a power issue. it wont hurt to change the ignition switch sense im sure that's 35 years old but its a convergent point somewhere. my gut says battery itself. i replaced it in October because the vacuum pump deep cycled the old one to much and wouldn't hold a charge. i dont remember this being a problem with old battery but i only drove car once a week

 

 

Holy sheep stuff. I don't know what to say. That's more "improvements" than I think I've ever seen in one place at one time. There is SO MUCH wrong with that, it hurts both of my brain cells to even try to wrap them around it. I would describe that as a "blivet" (WW2 slang for 10 gallons of s*** ... excuse me, excrement ... in a 9-gallon bucket). I feel sorry for you, you've got your work cut out for you.

To fix your immediate problem immediately, start at the side posts, where the factory batt cables go. They look like they've been under 10,000 ft of salt water for about 25 years. Clean them up as described above. Soak the cable ends and the bolts in baking soda & hot water, and wire-brush them until clean and shiny; use the same stuff on, and do the same things to, the side terminals of the batt itself. Wipe some dielectric grease on everything to keep corrosive chemicals out as much as practical. Move that one red wire that's under the + bolt, keeping it from tightening properly, to one of those other ... places.

Problems with grounding between the engine and the chassis can cause all manner of weird things to happen. I'd recommend connecting a piece of braid, or a short thick batt cable, somewhere convenient between the block (or as close to it as possible) and either the "frame" or the firewall. Without that connection, any current that needs to get from the chassis back to the batt, can't. Something like this https://www.autozone.com/batteries-s...9g/1053343_0_0, or maybe this https://www.autozone.com/batteries-s...4l/1053358_0_0 except shorter.

At the starter, check the wires at "positive battery cable" carefully. There should be acoupla other wires besides the batt cable. Those are the fusible links. Make sure all that is clean and tight. Put a new HEAVY DUTY terminal on the wire that keeps coming loose, like common sense would dictate; something about like this https://www.autozone.com/miscellaneo...ect/421748_0_0. Skweeeeeeze it tight with needlenose or something so it grips the thing on the starter tightly. No sense dealing with THAT over and over and over. Clean it up and fix it RIGHT once and for all.

I'm afraid to even guess what that big thick wire coming off of the + terminal might go to. That looks dangerous. Might want to figure out some other way to do whatever that's doing before it catches fire and burns the car down.

I'd suggest you track down where every single one of those heinous non-factory wires goes. Eliminate, eliminate, eliminate. There's NO WAY one car needs all that.

Wouldn't hurt, once you get all the stuff identified that all that CRAP feeds, and cut it down to what's needed without abuncha BS, to put in a fuse block of some sort, so that you don't have unprotected hard battery running all over the place and just waiting for a wire somewhere to chafe or melt through and start a fire, and wire up whatever needs to be wired up, PROPERLY.

 

I read. Then I saw the bike wheel skewer. Yeah, start with the cables and connections. With work like that, the easy to reach stuff up by the battery may be where the magic stopped. Hopefully.