Mopar Muscle Association UK

The current (amps) you have there are not your problem.

Mate, you got the leads in the right terminals for the meter? The black should be in Common, and the red should be in V/Ohms for resistance / voltage readings and A (amps) for current (with dial at corresponding value). I know its well blurred but for reading current I THINK, your red lead should be in the top red terminal. It isnt in your top pic. I cant quite read the scale. A clearer picture might prove me wrong thopugh

tonight when i got homeabout 6.30ish i connected the battery up again, i wasnt expecting much apart from the usual, however the engine fired up first time very easily i ran the engine for a while to warm up, checked the charging voltage, whilst idling and reads 14.64v, with a bit of revs goes up to 15.02v any more revs and the voltage dosnt get any higher, after 15mins turned off the engine and waited a minute or two, attempted to fire the engine up again and the same, fired up effortlessly, left the engine running for a few minutes, turned the engine off and went inside, just before 9pm went out to the car and again the engine fired up effortlessly, i will fire the engine up again before i leave for work in the morning.

i have taken the interior light lens off and the bulb is blown but all the fittings etc are clean no rust anywhere, how can i check the voltage in the interior light is correct? there is no boot light that i can see, if the car had one it could have been taken out, also after turning the engine off the first time i turned the headlights on and they worked perfectly as did the indicators and the heater works to

now i could be wrong but many mopars allow you to switch on the interior light by turning the headlamp switch as far anticlockwise as possible. i.e brightest setting for dash lights and 1 click more

the light will work with the ignition on and off

any other curtesy lights are on the same circuit.

the dome light is set into the roof.

the back of it should not press on the inside of the metal roof but it probably will...however chrysler had a few ways of ensuring it didn't short out . some have a back on them others just have a bit of fiber board/cardbord that was orginally glued to the roof or the back of the light/ haven't established which

either way afetr 30 or 40 years of condensation it can come off and move about exposing the spade connectors at the ends of the light fitting to the inside of the metal roof.

my cars battery used to go flat and occaisionally i would get the smell of burning plastic.

because my light didn't work i had no idea that the feature on the headlight switch existed so my interior light was powerd up all the time and occasionally shorted out somewhere in the roof heating up the wire all the way back to the junction behind the kick panel.

it never got hot enough to go on fire and it never really sparked or arced because the headlamp switch was so corrded and kanckerd that it didn't allow much current to flow.

i re stuck the fibreboard
fitted a headlamp switch out of a jeep (its the same and you can change the knob for yours)
job done.

check it by switching the light on by either opening a door or using the dash headlanp switch.

put meter on volts DC range

stick the black lead into any clean body metalwork junction you can (i usually wedge mine under the edge of the alluminium sill trim plate)
and stick the red lead on one end or t'other of the bulb one end should read 12 volts. if you get nothing try black lead to one end and red to the other. if you get - 12 then the black in on the power end and the red is on the return lead (which will earth to the body at one of the door jam interior light buttons, continuity test it with ya beeper if you want).

next issue was the 4 pin connector from the ignition switch. it had corroded in a way that on damp mornings the car would start but on dry mornings it wouldn't electric supply was erratic for all circuits and i was getting only 8-9 volts on the leads into the fuse box,

that connector was cut off and was replaced by using plastic coated screw connectors choccy block stuff for cooker rated wireing

next the car started refusing to do anything. usually on a saturday half way round shepherds bush roundabout.
this was caused by the collpase of the ingition lock switch. that was rebuilt using the springs out of a front door yale lock

other fun i have had

bulkhead connectors stopped headlamps horn working
all pins cleaned bent slightly and sprayed with wd40

none of my lights earthed properly so 1 set of indicators worked normally one set blinked apprx 3 times a minute

my fuse box was so corroded i had 12 volts at the feed side and anything from 0m -5 volts at the other end of the fuse. that sat in a bucket of coke for 3 weeks and then got a pollish up with brasso wadding wrapped round a rubber tipped dremmel bit.
put the fuses back in and sprayed the whole thing with PCB board varnish. looks a bit crappy but hasn't been an issue since

the earth strap to my engine was bolted on to an additional bolt at the engine mount which was loose so i had intermittent good and bad running of my points ignition (new strap new bolt spiky washer and junked the points)

the rear lights didn't work because the numberplate light shorted out to the bumper but the bumper mounts were so rusty it again saved the plastic on the loom burning up.

none of the dash lights worked cos it wasn't screwed down

the brake warning light had been taped over to hide the fact that the master cylinder was in emergency 1 circuit mode....i had no back brakes

now all of this really caused me a lot of frustration and annoyance cos the car in general is pretty good.

i ended up working from the battery to the fuse box via the ignition switch with a volt meter to check i got 12v between the wire i was testing and the body. once i was happy with the feed to the fuses the same was done from each metal cap end of each fuse and then each spade connector for each fuse

I then followed each non working circuit until i got to the non functioning thing. (this highlighted my bulkhead connector issues as everything up front goes through there

next i used the beep beep continuity tester on the multimeter to check my switches actually switched something

1 pin switches check continuity between the body of the switch and the spade (some light switches)
2 pin switches hard to tell some of them work by connecting a live circuit to eath to complete the circuit i.e the switch is after the ancilliary that needs powerd

ignition switch you will have 1 feed wire (thick)
2 (ornage a blue i think) wires that feed general circuits and ignition circuit power to the fuse box
and a thin one that goes off to the solenoid that controles the starter.

its probably best just to voltage check each at different positions.

anyway its a pain in the butt
but worthwhile as i haven't (touch wood) had any issues
but you need the wireing diagram for your car to establish which wires carry power and which wait until a switch is switched to carry power.

eg the brake lights circuit. the bulbs holders are powered up but the light doesn't light until the circuit is completed by the switch earthing. its bolted to the brake peddle bracket.


anyway if the wires are still good but its just the connectors don't worry it can be sorted

if the wires have all been replaced with grey door bell wire and no lables worry

you are not alone in your quest for good eletrics

dave

sounds like youve had your fair share of electrical issues!!
i didnt know about the interior light switch on the headlight knob i will get a new bulb and see what happens but probably check for a current before i do,

i started the car again this morning, fired up a dream as usual so i decided to drive it to work all 50+ miles not a problem ran lovely even got up to 75

Just got to get home then

fingers crossed




there's always the AA

Great explanation Dave....I found out on E body Cudas that the wipers are earthed through a screw that holds on the dash trim..

...not noticeable and often left out if the dash was removed, when working on or under the dash.....took me quite a while to find that baby... cos it looks just as if it holds the plastic on, but it has an earth strap inside it and the screw connects it to the chassis of the dash .....bit fustrating at the time.

interesting topic, just a quick question tho. On the way to drags my battery wasnt charging. Fuel pump went kaput on way back so I cant do proper testing till next payday So.. I can only go off what I noticed on ampmeter gauge.

Ignition off - the needle is fully neutral.
Ignition on - jumps to neg. a little.
Engine on - same as above, ie: slightly neg.

All my lights, ancillaries etc. work fine, with the engine on & off. Battery doesn't discharge at night at all. Fully charged battery lasted me to stratford & half way back - Thats with running round the site, to town etc...

When I rev the motor above 2500 rpm tho the needle starts to creep slightly towards neutral tho - but still on negative side - reckon its alternator, its old and I found a stick in it when I cleaned it the day before drags

Any ideas ?

Like I said, I dont want to sound ignorant but I can't do proper tests till my car runs

yep sounds like you were running totally or nearly totally on the battery, must have been a good one.
But i would say its not charging fully or much

When my alternator body cracked at last years Nats the charge started to fall off and on the way home meter went Neg charge, Optima battery, very good got me home,
replaced alternator, job done...but yes you need to check the output from the alternator using one of "the Daves" tests in the posts above

now beware this works with beetle alternators i have not tried it with a mopar one

apply 12 volts to the field connector

and spin the alternator with an eletric drill (socket extension and socket onto pulley bolt if posible

if you get a nice voltage at the bolt on connector alternator is fine. (it won't be the 14.5 you wouild expect because at full field power the alternator will be well hard to turn, in fact spin it up first then add field power).

now i think it should be DC but again depends on if the alternator has the rectifier built in some don't and its in the regulator or a sperate box

if the alternator works the issue lies with your regulator.

the twitching of the ammeter needle could be anything but is possibly your regulator switching current to and away from you alternator field connector in an attempt to charge the battery.


Back to Mr Dodge's issue

just thought

you can start the car fine when cold....most of the time
you can start the car when hot....some of the time

when it won't start the dash dims considerbly
what makes the dash dim..... a lack of power
what is the only thing in the car that can suck up most of the 100+ amps avilalble apart from a short circuit? the starter motor
if the starter motor is jamming or has an issue where only some of the coils on the armature power up it can flow a massive current with little or no action. hence issue

DC electric motors use massive current when still or just starting to spin only limited by resistance of the supply wires the battery and the coils in the motor. when it spins fast the back emf caused by constantly creating and breaking the field around each coil as it spins eventually starts to limit current flow and ultimately the speed the motor spins at

so still motor or stuck motor will bring your battery down fast its like a short circuit
fast easy spinning motor will use much less current

eeeeeeruuuuurrrrrrrgh sore head

dave

You might have something there Dave. I was scratching my head trying to figure what would drain that much current without either blowing a fuse of frying a wire.
The starter motor sounds promising to me.

Yes,I recall a similar situation with a Transit diesel. The commutator was badly worn,as were the brushes. Sometimes it would start,another it would just lock and get hot. Always OK with a clout from a club hammer Cleaned the com. in the lathe and fitted new brushes,a week later it spun a big end

Dave999, we aint payin you enough

AllKiller wrote:Dave999, we aint payin you enough

too kind

if i'm right i'll eat me hat
if i'm right look how much wrong i wrote before i got there.
if i'm wrong well nouts changed has it


latil yes indeed

big hammer to side of motor
small hammer to end case but avoid the solendoid plastic cap and.... don't strike an arc off anything.



dave