Electrical problem. Help?

TheGreatAndPowerfulOz · Fri Oct 27, 2006 11:53 pm

For those of you who don't know:
2001 Leganza SE, automatic

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It was a dark and stormy night.
Thick fog was silently creeping in and the rain was giving no signs of releasing it's relenting grip over my small town.

So you have the picture of my driving conditions. LOL

Anyway, everything was fine when I started. Rolling along, headlights on, stereo turned up loudly.

I get to an intersection, put on my signal, step on the brakes and stop. When I leave the intersection and start to accelerate, both the brake light and the battery light come on at the same time.

I step on the brakes again and no brake lights come on at all.

Weird.

I stop the car, turn the engine off and put the car in park.
I turn the ignition to ON, but do not start and step on the brake to listen for the CLICK of the shifter release ... and I hear it.
This tells me the brake light switch is working since I can get out of Park and into Drive.

I start the car again and everything seems to be fine, but the brake and battery lights are still on and there are still no brake lights.

It is still dark and raining outside so I have not yet gone to check for bad fuses or anything obviously wrong.

Any ideas?

lanowoo · Post by **lanowoo** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 2:12 am

Eh not really, id say to check for a bad connnection / crossing wires on the brake harness, brake fluid may have grounded something?? i duno.

daewoomofo · Post by **daewoomofo** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 4:12 pm

actually ive heard of both lights coming on when peoples alternators go bad (i dont know why it does that but its happened before). id get the alternator checked. good luck on finding the problem, keep us posted

TheGreatAndPowerfulOz · Mon Oct 30, 2006 6:06 pm

The alternator going bad sounds like most sensable answer to the problem since the car stopped charging and was very quickly draining the battery totally flat. This happened about a month or so ago, then it suddenly started working again. The alternator was also making a strange whining noise which also stopped and everything seemed to be working.

I'll take it out and get it tested and replace it when I know for sure that is the problem.

daewoomofo · Post by **daewoomofo** » Mon Oct 30, 2006 10:03 pm

if the alterantor was making a whining noise then it is at very least on its way out, but its prolly gone bad. if thats not the problem then its definatly some thing you need to get looked at.

MMamdouh · Post by **MMamdouh** » Tue Oct 31, 2006 12:19 pm

most probably the sound is due to bad bearings... fairly easy to replace.

MMamdouh

woo · Post by **woo** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 6:22 am

it happens to my girlfriends 89 pulsar (the ones with a GM 1.

. it can be as simple as a bad earth on the chassis somewhere

Aneab · Post by **Aneab** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 7:02 am

Yeha check your grounds too, my friend and i made a ground kit, for his car... but some of the grounds didn't make a great connection, even after cleaning the contacts.... and it actually made the car run worse... and not start every time...

MMamdouh · Post by **MMamdouh** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 9:57 am

anyone knows the location of all grounding points on a lanos?

MMamdouh