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electrical fault

SpinDrift

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I had a problem with my 1997 3.0 TD auto Colorado. Two or three times, within a few seconds of turning on the engine the engine and all electrics (dash electrics and headlights) just died. When I then turned the key to the off position and then back on ... nothing, no dash/warning lights, no engine. This led me to suspect that the fault was electrical. I opened up the main fuse box, checked the fuses and the relays. On tapping the PWR OUTLET relay the headlights came back on and the car could be started again. I opened up the relay and it seems fine – there is no pitting on the contacts and they open and close normally when triggered by a 9v battery. I have re-seated the relay and now the car seems to be working fine but I don’t trust it – I am now afraid that I might have a sudden loss of power when driving on the motorway.

Does anyone know what the PWR OUTLET relay controls? Does what I have described above tie in with the function(or mal-function) of this relay? Or could something else have been the cause the engine to die?

Also the relay is a single normally open one. Toy sell it for around £24. Can this be easily swapped with a generic one? Trouble is that other than knowing that it is 12v, I don’t know what the current rating through the coil or across the contacts should be.

thanks

Reinhard
 
Reinhard, sorry to say that I can't help you on this one. Very odd. There is also a fuse for 'guages' which covers all the dash. Worth checking that it's not cracked or something. But beyond that, I really don't know.
I don't have the manual any more as I sold it with Lil Blue.


Chris
 
Checked the manual and this is what it has for the relay 35 (is this the one you pulled?):

35. ALT 100 A: All components in "PWR OUTLET (FR)", "PWR OUTLET (RR)", "TAIL", "RR HTR236", "DEFOG", "STOP", ALT-S", "AM1" AND "HEATER" fuses.

Makes no sense to me at all :cry:
 
I've only had that sort of problem once - and that was a very long time ago with a Lada 1500 estate :oops:

Naturally it cut out while I was in the outside lane of a Motorway.

It turned out to be a faulty ignition switch (I guessed as much and turned the ignition off then on, the engine fired up and all was well - apart from the laundry bill :roll: ).

The fact that everything died makes me think its also a problem with the ignition switch. The trouble is, its probably impossible to re-create the fault so how does one test it :?:

I'd be inclined to spray electrical contact cleaner into the ignition switch and see if the problem re-occurs - its a bit like bomb disposal but the alternative could have you replacing a lot of components unnecessarily.

I would also go around all the fuse / relay boxes removing each fuse & relay and clean up the contacts.

Also undo and clean all earth contacts.

Check the battery connections for cleanliness and tightness.

Unfortunately, if this makes the problem go away you will never know the cause.

Bob.
 
SpinDrift said:
I had a problem with my 1997 3.0 TD auto Colorado. Two or three times, within a few seconds of turning on the engine the engine and all electrics (dash electrics and headlights) just died.
Do you mean on two or three seperate occasions or were they all in one occurance of the problem?

SpinDrift said:
On tapping the PWR OUTLET relay the headlights came back on and the car could be started again. I opened up the relay and it seems fine – there is no pitting on the contacts and they open and close normally when triggered by a 9v battery. I have re-seated the relay and now the car seems to be working fine
It could be a dry joint on the coil to terminal wires? I would replace that relay with OEM for the sake of £24 but keep the old one in case it still happens. It sounds like the kind of fault where all you can do is investigate it each time it happens until you figure it out.

To see if that relay can cause that fault just remove it again and see if the same stuff goes off ;)
 
Hi All,

thanks for your feedback. This is/was a strange one. When the power failure occured it happened on three different occasions in 24 hours within a few seconds of starting the engine. I initialliy though it was the PWR OUTLET relay. It was not. The car starts with the relay out. I am not sure what had happened but have been driving the car for the last couple of weeks without problem. If it occurs again I will get an electician to have a look.

cheers
 
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Do you have an imoboliser and is it aftermarket or OEM? That would be my main suspect I think, if you have one ...
 
Hi Jon,

As far as I know the car has an OEM imobiliser fitted - good point, it could be that. I'll get it checked out.

thanks
 
If it's anything like the 80 series you may find that the alarm/imoboliser was dealer fit and isn't actually OEM, but as I say that's from the 80 series of about the same age. Point being it hopefully then will be a fairly seperate black box that could easily be removed and replaced with a new system rather than being embedded in some core ECU that does other stuff.
 
Hi Jon,

good point - thanks. I'll have a look for an insurance/thacham approved system.

cheers
 
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