Strange Charging Problem

fettcols

Okay, I was doing the brakes on my better half’s Taurus and she was using my wagon. She calls me up and says there's a problem, it won't start.

So I drive over to her job and the battery is fully drained. So I jump it and just get some dim lights and that's about it. Knowing it's had the same battery since I bought the car I went down the street and bought a new one and replaced it.

So I put the battery in and notice the two front corner lights lit, I get inside and the lights are turned off..... strange

I put the key in and turn it on and without hitting the starter I hear the cooling fan running.... strange The engine is cold and it’s just the passenger side fan.

I hit the starter and it turns over just fine but doesn't fire and the check engine light is lit in the dash.

I then scratch my head and call a tow truck. Anyone ever seen this kind of thing before?

SiWagon

Pull a code.That's the AC fan .You'll need to see what's causing the fan to b on.Check to see if there's ground to the block @ the engine coolant temp.switch.That's what happen to mine.The corner lites is probably a separate prob.Could b a grounding prob.You might have 1 prob or up to 3 PR Bs.

ragenasian

It sounds like a ground problem.

My friend had a CRX and bought one of those grounding kits. The idiot company selling them anodized the grounding plate so it wasn't grounding properly. The car would do all kinds of weird stuff. Lights were staying on that weren't supposed to be on, turn signals wouldnt work, it was strange. Once I sanded down the grounding block everything went back to the way it was. Weird thing I thought was that the guy drove it for like a week like this. He had to leave early from work because he had no headlights even when he turned them on. :?

Just a thought.

fettcols

I haven't pulled codes on it yet, haven't had a chance to look at it in the daylight yet. I'm figuring relays or grounds, they seem to be the root of most electrical problems. Just hopeful that somebody may have had something similar happen.

Haydz

Installed a car stereo recently?

wagodizzle

check the grounds on the side of the engine bay, where a bunch of black wires go into this plastic box which is bolted the the frame. my idiot friend did a "wire tuck" :roll: on his EF and unbolted that box and let it hang... his electrical was way whack before i told him what was wrong.

fettcols

Haydz wrote:

Installed a car stereo recently?

Installed a CD player back in January, haven't had any trouble with it.

So I got some more of the story, a friend from her work tried to jumpstart it before I got there. May have hooked the leads up backwards but this isn't confirmed.

I cleaned a few contacts up on it and popped in the new battery. It starts and runs now but the alternator is only putting out twelve volts. Can anyone refresh my memory here, it's been a decade since I've changed the alternator in an EF, if I remember right the car I did it on had powersteering and AC, I just dropped the left axelshaft to get it out from under the hood.

My car has AC but no power steering, can I get it out of there without having to do that? It seems like the wagon has a little more room than the other models. I was thinking about trying to snake it out through the hoses on the tranny side or maybe removing the master cylinder. Any thoughts?

wagodizzle

is it MPFI? then you can either remove the MC, which if your hoses are stuck can be a huge PITA, or you can just drop the left drive shaft like i did.

if you have DPFI, you have plenty of space to pull it out from the top.

fettcols

Right now it's DPFI, and I was thinking I could snake it out above the tranny through all the coolant and vacume lines. I have everything I need to make it MPFI and I thought for a minute about just doing that and changing it while the manifold is out but... Probably shouldn't introduce more problems until this one is solved.

Thanks man, I'll probably try it tonight or in the morning.