linderpat

Yikes! I've been trying to sort thru a no start problem - have spark, smelled like I have fuel, but decided I needed to swap out relays to be sure - pulled the bottom board off in front of the CE panel - and look what I found

There is a bundle of wires melted together. There is a relay attached to the end of this bundle. What the heck could this be? Could this be affecting the no start The car is an 86.5. Had no issues whatsover prior to now - it ran fine right up until I lifted it and started a power steering flush job (I had moved the coil out of the way or this; see other thread for more detail on no start:https://rennlist.com/forums/928-foru...-no-start.html ).

Should I avoid trying to start the car until I sort this out?

Any thoughts appreciated!

WallyP

The most common reason for such a bodge is to bypass the fuel pump relay. If the wires go to U15, that's what it is.

The large plug with the green wire is the oxygen sensor connection.

You will have to have the wiring diagrams to straighten this out. If you don't have them, contact Jim Morehouse and get the complete 928 tech info CD set from him...

linderpat

Wally - why would someone want to by pass the fuel pump relay? Also, the relay in the picture was just laying there on the floor.
Can I just disconnect this mess? I do have all the electrical diagrams (I have the full set of WSMs), but I find them very difficult to follow.

worf928

+1 what Wally wrote.

Looks like you have a least one power lead showing copper. That's not good. You've got random-seeming splices into more than one circuit. Who know's what it does? Or what it is no longer doing? Or what it was supposed to do?

If this was my car here's what I'd do:
1) Get the factory wiring diagrams.
2) Trace all this "PO" wiring and note wire color and where all the wires go by fuse panel connector number (e.g. A22, U15, etc.)
3) Draw up a wiring diagram of all this.
4) Inspect the factory wiring going into the panel plugs and note any wires by connector number that look "melty."
5) Use the "PO" diagram and the WSM diagrams to reverse engineer what this PO wiring is trying to do.

Once I'd made all the notes, I'd pull the fuse panel and examine the backside wiring and repeat step 4 for the backside.

Once you know which circuits the PO wiring is spliced into, then for each PO'd circuit you'll need to decide whether to remove the PO wiring, find and fix the actual problem, or replace/rebuild the PO wiring to make it safer and cleaner.

Last, once everything was working, if any of the PO-designed wiring is left, I'd make a new wiring diagram for future reference.

It will probably be a waste of time to troubleshoot your no-start problem until you've at least figured out which circuits are effected by the PO'd wiring.

linderpat

The jumper for this mess comes out of the Q3 slot. One factory yellow wire that would have gone unmolested into the Q3 slot was cut, and these wires were all tied into it.

SharkSkin

Looks ugly. In addition to the above advice, IMHO you should disconnect the battery and remove the CE panel so you can inspect the back side for melted wires. It only takes about 10 minutes to remove the panel -- maybe 15 since you'll probably need to remove the fuel/ignition brains.

SharkSkin

If it's Q13, that's the starter relay -- probably a starter defeat for an aftermarket alarm.

linderpat

Interesting. The melted wires look like they've been that way for awhile tho. I haven't had start problems before either. This is very perplexing. I'm diving into the WSM electrical diagrams now, but I have little faith in my interpretive skills

Alan, Alan where art thou?

worf928

Go as far as you can and then ask questions.

CE Panel Connectors: What you need to know about them to begin reading the WSM is molded on to the plugs (difficult to see, perhaps, but there.)

- Labeled A to Z from left to right and colored-keyed with the panel sockets
- For each plug the left-bank is "1" the right bank is "2"
- For each bank the bottom connection is "1" and the top is "5" (IIRC, double-check this yourself with your Mark I eyeball.)

Thus A25 is the left-most plug, top connection, right bank. Q13 is the "Q" plug, left bank, middle connection.

Once you know the connection number you can go to the WSM and begin identifying the circuit.

worf928

Also, (86.5 owners please chime-in) I think you will need to reference both '87 and '86 diagrams as IIRC the 86.5 is part one and part the other.

linderpat

Jeez Dave - I hope not! One set is plenty headache!!!

Anyway, from the WD in the FWM, Dave A is correct - Q13, which according to the manual is indeed yellow (see middle pic in post #1, it's a yellow wire coming out of the harness and into position Q13 which is being jumped), and is from the starter, to the CE panel at Q13, thru a relay at position XIV, and ultimately to pin 4 on the LH. So, it seems like this jumbled mess might have been for an aftermarket alarm, altho other than wiring, I don't see any other evidence of one. Anyway, I'm going to pull it out, resolder the yellow wire, clean all grounds elsewhere on the car, and see if it starts. Maybe I should take Dave C's advice and pull and inspect the CE panel first, to see if there are any issues on the back side. I can do an R&R while I'm at it.

Thanks thus far you two Daves - this board is absolutely invaluable to me now that I live in a plce where I am completely on my own!!!

the flyin' scotsman

You're not that far away Ed..............might make a nice weekend drive and next weekend is a long one for us.

Keep us posted and good luck.

worf928

The CE Panel comes out very quickly. Pull the big red tab under the connectors to unlock them and then just wiggle them out. The rest is pretty obvious. Just make sure you take a picture of all the routing of stuff on top and behind. I've found scary stuff back there - like a loose floatin' around 12v connector for one of the fuse sockets...

As for goin' soldering, when confronted with something like this, I like to actually find a problem first. That way you can be sure or not if you've fixed something. On the other hand if you return everything to as-close-to-factory as you can, it'll be easier to find the actual problem with all the PO'd wiring out of there.

Good luck.

linderpat

Thanks guys. I will say all the write ups made it look like an easy 20 min job to pull that CE panel - ha! Not for me. Like everything else, takes hours. Had to remove the shelf, unscrew the top CE panel board, and so on....nothings ever easy with these suckers!
Malcolm, would love to have you down, but my boys are coming in from the east next weekend for a stay, so I'll be focusing on doing stuff with them. If I still haven't gotten it going afterwards, then I'll fluff a pillow for you here! I used to do this all the time when I lived back East - folks would come in from out of town for tech sessions on my car, and camp out. My wife never minded and enjoyed the company too. The shark crowd is a good crowd!

SharkSkin

Well, now that you've done it once and know where all the screws are, it will go quicker next time. Looking again at the wiring diagram, Q13 goes to the starter relay output, so that relay was probably added to bypass something like a bad starter relay, ignition switch, neutral safety switch, etc.

Where were the other wires connected?