While visiting our friends in Wyoming Nicole finally put a new ignition switch in Annie. She then promptly thanked us by escalating her previously extremely random No-Start issue.
So, once we had settled in to our new digs Nicole began digging into Annie in a way that has long been deserved.
As with all good automotive experiences, it all started with a spark!
Pink is pretty but it isn’t really what you want.
Testing of individual parts (like the dual pick-up dizzy) revealed them all to be ‘o.k.’
That left the wiring...
And lots of deciphering of diagrams like this which Nicole could
not have done without Ram4ever (he rocks)!
Oh, look at all of the pretty colors.
Time to inspect, trace, check continuity, resistance and look for problem areas.
Believe it or not, this is standard issue and not as bad as it looks.
This, on the other hand, had seen better days.
Now we’re talking.
More sparks. Because they’re cool!
O.K. fine they also provide answers.
For a while we thought the ECU was the root of all that was No-Start.
Some of our relays had corrosion on their terminals. Corrosion = bad flow.
Others began performing questionably on testing and begged to be opened up.
There were more sparks because... just because.
It’s been three long weeks... do we really need a reason? Fine. It’s fun to spark!
It was time to get some of that wiring gathered up, wrapped up and stowed away.
Loads of cleaning up, re-grounding, inspections and diagnostics later... Annie was
now consistently providing a No-Start condition. Um... it was supposed to get better.
The time had come.
The 50-way bulkhead disconnect and fusible links could not be ignored any longer.
Oh yeah! Those are all labeled, right?!
Corrosion in the ‘battery’ row of our 50-way adapter.
Preference is to replace these wires since it is traveling but for now they got cleaned.
A few more days of continuity, resistance and OHM’ing later and other than some corrosion nothing had truly revealed itself to be the culprit. So, there was only one thing left to do. It was time to put our girl back together and cross our eyes, fingers and toes.
VROOM! VROOM! VROOM!
THAT’S OUR GIRL.
Certainly, this tale is not over. Our Annie is 26 years old and most of what we’ve found and replaced so far has been original. There will be problems. There will be inconsistencies. There will be questionable behavior. But she has served us wonderfully in our adventures and thus we allow her these quirks. For now, she’s got a little more get up in her go and we’ve got our girl back. At least until the next time she puts her foot down to remind us that she likes a little ‘Annie centered’ attention now and then.