ok, so a few days ago the fuse for my tails/dash lights blew, so i got a bigger fuse cause this is the second time this happened, and i know its due to me having all 5 of my gauges power running off the same wire comming off the radio-light up harness so that when i turn the lights on then the gauge lights all turn on along with the dash lights like OEM. so last night im taking my GF home, i pull in the driveway and i go to shut the car off and take the key out, but the car was still running. so i put the key back in, then to ON, and back to OFF and took it out, still running. so im like WTF and quick pop the hood and disconnect the battery and the car dies out. so i wait a while and then hook it back up, get in to see if it will start. starts fine, so i see if it shuts off. shuts off fine…did it again just for giggles. so its running, i go to turn on the lights, no headlights, no tails. check signals, no signals, no brake lights either. all that works are hazards. WTF! so i get the GF and her mom to drive ahead of me and lead me home. peeked at fuses and that same friggen fuse is blown, and im guessing a few others cause normally when it blows only the tails dont work. so im going to take a look at it tomarrow and run the power for all the gauges on its own circuit directly from the battery with an in-line fuse and a toggle switch and put the right size fuses back in. hopefully that takes care of it but anyone got a clue what went wrong?
ok, so today i go to work on the car and see what the hell is up…7 or 8 fuses are blown…WTF…fog lights, headlights, tailights, signals, rear defogger, dash illumination, etc. WTF…how so many??? so i replace all the fuses, and i re-do the wiring from my aftermarket gauges to have their own direct power from the batter with 12gauge wire with an in-line fuse and a switch, that way its not drawing extra power from the dash lighting/tail lights (same fuse). so i go to put in a new fuse for the dash/tails…blows right as im putting it in (2x the called for size), however no key in the ignition and no switches open, so theoretically no power should be going to that fuse correct? well for giggles i put the key in to check the rest of the lighting, two of the fuses previously blown blow right away as i turn the key before i even tried turning the lights on. so as of right now the three fuses flown are “light switch”, “fog lamps”, and another one also called “light switch” WTF!!! :rant: :rant:
sounds like you could have a major short in the main harness… be extremely careful and put a fire extinguisher in your car, disconnect the battery when you park it. I am NOT kidding for once. Fortunately, sounds like the short is after the fuse box, but still.
so do you think its between the battery and the fuse box or what?
yea, it sounds like you may have melted a wire, and its probably grounding out somewhere. i had that happen to me before, the smoking dash was pretty cool, but fixing it sucked.
well. if the short was there, then it wouldnt matter if the fuse was in or not, because the current wouldn’t be passing through the fuse. so it’s after the fusebox…
damn, so im prolly gonna have to take the whole dash out?
yea get a wire scematic see if they share any powers. have u put any high wattage bulbs in recently
ok, heres the thing. three fuses that are blowing i took a continuity tester to, and they are grounded on both sides of the fuse with no battery in the car…this obviously makes no sense. nothing has been changed recently, just all the sudden there are this problems. fuses # 32, 44, and 61 if anyone needs that info.
Car wouldn’t stop running? Damn. That happened to me on my old Sentra. I was installing a tach (as small as I could find, it was a stick with no tach) and I tapped one wire that turned out to be the wrong one so I tapped another without taking the time to tape up the first. They touched, sparked. Car wouldn’t stop running after that unless I disconnected the battery and the coil. I poked at the car for a while but I knew even less then about working on cars tahn I do now and ultimately took it to a dealer to figure out. Turned out I fawked the ECU. After getting raped for diagnostic labor and the part, I had a 900 dollar tach and lesson in patience. So, uh, yeah, I hope you didn’t do any damage to your ECU.
But yeah, it definitely sounds like you passed too much current through a wire and melted it to something it shouldn’t be touching (other wires and/or ground.)
LOOK WHAT I FOUND :rant:
the lighting switch wires all melted together causing the short. im GUESSING this is due to putting a 30amp fuse into a 10amp port cause i had too much drawing on it with all the gauges, i rewired the gauges to have their own separate circuit and im working on locating a new harness from the switch to the fuse panel so hopefully that solves it
Hahahah Im sorry, I had to laugh when I first saw that. Well, its a good think that you found it, and I hope that nothing is seriosly damaged beyond the wires. Looks like you were lucky there was no flame action goin on in your dash too. Good luck with that.
just want to tell u…theres a guy in barf (maybe he’s here now…) who can fix and replace those wirings very very neatly…
in case u need some help… 
he did my car…awesome result!
Will do wiring for ride in car, just ask boosted3g. :tup:
wiring problems now?
this is really getting freaky…your car reminds me of mine more and more every day i read about it, good luck man…get it runnin good and keep it…
i found out that the root of the problem may have well NOT been all my gauges…but straight from ford…i posted my problem on the focus forums and someone replied with this:(i guess alot of people have experienced this with the hatchbacks)
My purpose for posting it there and in Team Pit Stop is to ensure that others are aware that there may be a defect in some ZX3s that may lead to the failure of the taillights.
I would ask that a Mod sticky this thread so that the post are isolated to the Team Tech thread.
For more information about how I discovered the problem, please see this thread:
I have posted this topic as a warning to all current ZX3 owners.
It appears that in some cases, the rear wiring harness that runs through the rubber goose neck of the rear hatch may become worn. On my 2001 ZX3 S2 I found that the protective insulating coating on all eight of the wires had cracked and separated leaving the wires exposed such that they come into contact with one another which shorted out the rear taillights.
I also have a 01 ZX3 S2 but this problem is not isolated to the S2’s. It has happened to many people who own ZX3’s.
I’ve lost count of how many reports…
I’ve asked the mods to sticky my post and to add a poll to the original thread in order to help keep count but have not got anyone to do it yet.
Check my sig to read about the problem, how I discoverd it and to see photos.
It does not require the replacement of the entire wiring harness, just a patch to the rear.
If You’re Not Outraged, You’re Not Paying Attention!
Have You Checked Your Wiring Harness Lately
Please Click Here To Learn More!
w00t! Go ford!
i remember standing in my driveway that night and we couldnt figure out wtf th prob was… we replaced that fuse a bunch of times and it kept poping, so we finaly just overfused it …
overfusing is a really bad idea, hate to be a dick but u asked for a shorted harness when u did that