hmmmm scary ride home for me....

[bikerdude 0]

Driving home from work today minding my own business, turning onto another road. Went to give it some gas....hmmm car not moving, look down at gauges ok well everything is at zero....hmmmkay. Stereo still running, ac fan still running. Ahhh tried to start the car while moving but it didn't start......Stop the car, looked around puzzled, looked back in my mirror I see a little smoke, look at the hood oh there is more smoke. First thing that popped to my mind I have no fire extinguisher, and second thing that popped into my mind is that I have no more warranty!!!!! Popped the hood open, and I see a crispy ground chassis wire. GREAT!!!!!

Onto picture, sorry camera phone quality....

I guess I can say the amp to blame for that huh?

Swapped that out for 0/1gauge wire. Now everything is up and running again.

Sigh...what an evening

[platnum accord 0]

mmmm bbq.

[dopey 0]

mmmm bbq.

car-b-que

[platnum accord 0]

ah sorry, my bad... my bad.

lol wow your ride is smokin!!! lol. sorry.

[bikerdude 0]

ya guys are mean! LOLOLOL

[appleyard 0]

errmm fuses didnt blow?

[johnecon2001 82]

How in the hell did you burn up a ground wire???

If your system was setup right, the thing to burn (which shouldn't have burned at all) would be the power cable. AND it should have had a fuse on it to prevent an open short like this one.

You're lucky the car isn't one big black piece of metal.

[bikerdude 0]

the power wire does have a fuse 12" away from the bat. So yeah I dont know how a ground wire burned up. But considering it is the chassis ground, who knew?? No fuses blew...

And what do you mean if my system was setup right? This system is the same system that is in my car ever since oct 04, only things that changed was the subs, throughout the years. If something would have happen something should of many years ago. I believe it was just a freak of nature thats all!

Edited June 27, 2007 by bikerdude

[Aaron Clinton 2,372]

I had a wire go up in smoke once, that was interesting at 85+mph on I-95 south.

[audio-neon 34]

I had a wire go up in smoke once, that was interesting at 85+mph on I-95 south.

That is better than my going up in smoke experience. Driving home from Saratoga (about 45 minutes from my house) about a month and a half after I finished turbo'ing my blue neon, car stalls at 75 mph, look down at my gauges to see my temp gauge pegged... Blew a 2$ oil line that cost me a turbo'd motor.

And so far in my black car I have had one electrical fire from somebody doing a cob job on the radiator fan relay using quick connects on high current fans... (cob job took place before i bought the car). Yea my idea of fun is spending 3 hours rewiring a pcm, and cleaning up exploded battery.

[blazinlow 0]

Can someone please give me a possible explanation for this lol I am having a serious mind fudge right now!

[audio-neon 34]

Can someone please give me a possible explanation for this lol I am having a serious mind fudge right now!

Massive shorting of the cable, maybe a power wire touched the chassis?.

[djjdnap 78]

i guess this answers whether or not to fuse the ground cable, lmao

[ANeonRider 3]

Probably a bad connection on the ground cable, causing a huge amount of voltage drop across it.

[bikerdude 0]

You see every connection was solid. That ground wire is OEM, never touched by me! Everything was fine with this setup for the past 2+ years. Also considering that the chassis ground cable is 8 gauge, and trying to support every electrical features in the car, and it just got overloaded. I don't think that there could be a short or else one of the main fuses would have popped.

[mlstrass 1]

Usually that's caused by your main ground wire not doing it's job, and sending all the current through the much smaller chassis ground. Which it obviously can't handle and then smokes.

I've had 2 friends wire up a crappy ground set up on their race cars, and the car used the $50 shifter cable as the ground wire and smoked it. I was there to see it one time, not pretty....

[bikerdude 0]

Usually that's caused by your main ground wire not doing it's job, and sending all the current through the much smaller chassis ground. Which it obviously can't handle and then smokes.

I've had 2 friends wire up a crappy ground set up on their race cars, and the car used the $50 shifter cable as the ground wire and smoked it. I was there to see it one time, not pretty....

Which main ground wire are you talking about???

[blazinlow 0]

So if all my (big 3) main wires were upgraded to 4 gauge, I should be fine correct?

running a sundown 1500 and sax100.2 off stock 110 amp alt. and red top

I am worried now...

[BassAce 0]

Maybe too small of a wire that got too hot?

[TribeamConnek 0]

I was planning on upgrading my ground just to avoid that happening. I added a second ground in the back that goes straight to the chasis. The battery is grounded, the cap is grounded, and the amp is grounded. Since I weld I just made a grounding center. It takes all of the guess work out of finding grounding point because it is one big a$$ ground. It looks like a power rail that you may find in an amp except it is attached to the floor by bolts and a couple of wires are ran from it to the chasis just in case I decide to shake some bolts loose. I have had problems with my setup, but the only thing that burned up was the fuse. You can never be too safe when making sure you have a sufficient ground. I always safe if you thinks its good enough, you may wanna do a little bit more just to be on the safe side.

[TribeamConnek 0]

I don't like to use ring terminals. I prefer using grounding terminals. You can actually tell the difference. It seems like it takes the strain off the system a lil.