[Angry]

Alright so last night I was showing my girl a few things on my laptop. (funny how that sounds :lol: )... Im a wardriver.

Anyway, the laptop doesnt have a good battery so I had to use a 300watt DC to AC powerinverter...

Well I unplug my cellphone charger and plug in the inverter and well the lights kinda just dim and the radio cuts off.

I think a fuse blew, but its pouring outside dark and I cant find which one it is...The Cig lighter only works if the car is running, the clock in the dash reset, and the cdplayer wont come on... it has lights but dimly. and the clock also doesnt come one when you push the panel when the car is off.
Oh and for some really wierd rason the light in the cluster daying that your hatch is open stays dimely lit, Ive close and open the hatch several times...

So any idea what happened? Im confused...

 

[bobski]

Watts = Volts * Amps. 300w = 120v x 2.5a = 12v x 25a. The cigarette lighter fuse should be 15 or 20 amp, so you definately could have been pushing the circuit's limits.
Judging from the symptoms, you probably fried a ground wire. One of the ground points, connector pins or wires could have been corroded - plugging in a heavy load pushed it over the edge. The higher than normal resistance across the ground point prevented it from carrying enough current to fry the fuse, so the corroded area just heated up (the dimming lights - a material's resistance increases with temperature, current flow drops as resistance increases) and nuked itself.
The dash light brightness controller, clock, rear defogger switch, cigarette lighter, gauges/indicator lights and speed sensor all ground through a single wire in the dash harness. The harness plugs into the dash fuse box which grounds the wire through G401 (driver's kickpanel) and G301 (driver's front corner of the engine bay). Have fun.

 

[Angry]

Aaawww man...

Anybody got any pics of the 2 wires? heh...

Now Im gonna be cussing the whole way anit I?

 

[Angry]

Muhahahahahaha..... :twisted:

Fixed it...! I found A ground wire kinda up in the dash that had gotin a bit black ( I think or it was a coating from the factory) where it connected. So I just took it off and sanded with some sandpaper a bit and now everything works like its sopposed to...

Quickest fix yet... :rolleyes1:

 

[Dodo]

If its the case, your lucky you didnt burn the car up doing that. Wires catch fire very easily. Good luck with it. Hope it lasts.

 

[Angry]

Well it blew the fuse like it was sopposed today when I tried the inverter again. Im pretty sure the inverter is defunct because the last person I lent it to put the wrong size fuse in it. So it was stressing the ground. Nothing smelled burned and the wire itself was clean, just were it connected it had some red goo coating. The kind of red transparent coating they use in like computer PSUs to protect soldered connections. Why it was there I have no clue...

But all is good as far as I can tell, cell phone charger works fine...