Lost gauges?!?

[dustybo83]

So I stopped and bought gas last night. Everything was working fine. Get back in to take off, fire her up, and I have no speedo, tach, or console pod gauges. HELP?!

[fastblackmerc]

No gauges or no lights in the gauges?

[dustybo83]

Speedo/tach not reading, but lit.
Volts/oil pressure not reading, no lights.
But volts/oil pressure haven't lit up since I've owned the car

[dustybo83]

Ended up being a blown fuse. I feel lucky cause everything I seen with similar issues said the cluster was gonna need replaced

[dustybo83]

back again, now the fuse keeps blowing to the gauges. Only does it intermittently. May go weeks without blowing one, then blow them several times in a drive. Anyone else ever have this problem??

[fastblackmerc]

Check the harness in the engine compartment behind the drivers side cam cover. There is a long bolt that may be shorting out a wire in the harness.

[fastblackmerc]

Any work done to the car recently?

[dustybo83]

I'll check that, thanks. I haven't done any work on it lately, but it has had the engine replaced, so that's a possibility.
On another forum someone mentioned that the vanity lights in the sun visors sometimes short out where the wires come out of the a pillar, I'm gonna look and see if those are working or not.

[Turbov6Bryan]

Possible dime stuck in the 12v lighter inside the console?

It's the same harness

[fastblackmerc]

I'll check that, thanks. I haven't done any work on it lately, but it has had the engine replaced, so that's a possibility.
On another forum someone mentioned that the vanity lights in the sun visors sometimes short out where the wires come out of the a pillar, I'm gonna look and see if those are working or not.

That was going to be my next suggestion.

[dustybo83]

Okay, vanity lights and 12v lighter in console working with the blown fuse.
Used my multi meter at the fuse location (#6) and it's reading a full 14 volts while idling. Is there a resistor somewhere that might have gone bad? Cause all the other fuses in the block are only reading around 1.5v

[Turbov6Bryan]

I would say you have a loose ground, or ground wire is not hooked up

[RF Overlord]

Sorry to have to ask this, but are you reading across the fuse or between one end of the fuse and ground?

[dustybo83]

I stuck the meter prongs to wear the fuse would go into the block.

[Turbov6Bryan]

I stuck the meter prongs to wear the fuse would go into the block.

Put the ground lead to metal in the dash, then use the positive lead to measure voltage. Try a few places for ground so you know your meter is reading correctly

[dustybo83]

Okay, also on a side note, it doesn't blow till the engine is started.
Engine off, key turned on
Voltage from fuse to good ground 11.75v
Voltage across fuse 2.5v

Voltage across fuse after starting goes up to 5.2 then pops the fuse

[ByronRACE]

Why are you measuring voltage across the fuse terminals? The fuse has a variable resistance that depends on temperature and will not produce a useful/meaningful reading. Measure/probe positive voltage relative to chassis ground; that is meaningful. If you want to measure the current being absorbed by the circuit, you need to build a wiring harness that plugs in place of the existing fuse, and contains a fuse of the same value and an amp meter in series. Then, you can get a current reading with the key on/engine off when the fuse doesn't blow and compare that with what you think it should be. Once the fuse blows, you will have zero current so key on/engine on won't produce a reading other than "more than fuse value".

[dustybo83]

Haha, I'm just trying to provide as much information as I can bub.

[RF Overlord]

That fuse provides power to the O/D cancel switch in the shifter, the A/C compressor clutch, the LCM, the instrument cluster and the volt and oil pressure gauges. You can try unplugging each of those things one at a time to find the part that's blowing the fuse.

[dustybo83]

I finally figured this out if anyone's interested

[Ambitious1]

I finally figured this out if anyone's interested

Yes, I would be interested to know. If it can happen to one, it can to happen to others as well.

[Fman]

I'm interested Dusty

[RF Overlord]

Yeah, tell us what it was...