Went over a speed bump and when the rear end went over it the car shut off. Everything including all electrical power. Battery checked out o.k I noticed no spark when touching the negative battery terminal to the battery post. I know it's suppose to. What could be the likely issue?

 

Would check fusible link F100 and adjacent connecting cables in battery compartment, maybe somehow it got knocked loose or a corroded / kinked connector finally let go with the bump? F100 supplies fuse panel 3 in the engine compartment next to the left strut tower. Losing power to that panel would shut things down in a hurry.

Newtis link follows:
Fusible link F100

 

Is this fusible link located in the same place as the battery? The link you provided says it's in the cargo compartment behind an access panel. Thanks for your help

 

It's in the battery well mounted on the right hand (passenger in U.S.) side wall, next to the positive battery cable. You'll need to remove the battery to get to it.

 

Where in this pic of my compartment is it? I can't find it

 

Looks like someone has been fiddling around in there. If I had to guess the link is inside the taped up portion of the cable.

Mine is stock and the link is inside the orange housing under the positive cable.

Heres a link to a photo of that box opened up.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...component.html


Below where the screwdriver is pointing

Stock configuration.

You might want to spend a few bucks and get back to the original configuration. I'm not sure a few wraps of electrical tape cuts it.

robj

 

I will once I get it back home. I got stranded with it. What could you recommend me do to it so I can start it up and get it back home. Remove that tape and tighten the link or clean it. Do you think I could replace the link? Thanks 😊 so much. This is really helping me out

 

Stephen
Clean out the bottom of the battery case - loose nuts & bolts etc..
Check the bottom of the battery in case it got punctured.
Do you know what the second red cable is for? I don't think it's original.

 

Going with: unwrap the tape and see what's underneath. We're talking about what *should* be a 250A fusible link, which should not be 'delicate' but at this point who knows what the previous owner did with it. Could be he replaced it with a giant glass fuse or the odd length of Romex for all we know.

That said, although the battery compartment looks "modified" in there I'd like to hear from another early R53 owner (2002-2004) if their battery compartment set-up differ from the later years, especially if we can get a picture of what a stock set up actually looks like.

Anyone, Bueller?

 

Someone definitely Mcgivered it. Don't have power to steering wheel controls and airbag light stays on(have had this problem since I've had this car). Been told that is because a separate circuit running from the battery blew which causes that issue. Never has caused this problem before. I honestly don't know this battery cable is wired up. But that fusible link box is definitely missing(the set up in the pic)

 

A voltmeter should tell whether or not there is current flow across that red positive cable ...right?

 

Stephen
Groping in the dark here a bit!
Check the voltage at the jump-start terminal under the hood - that will tell you if the wiring from the rear battery is OK.
The heavy red cable from there runs across the back of the engine & down to the starter & alternator. In another thread, it had moved around, chafed through to the copper core & occasionally shorted out. Turn it over & check that.

 

The jump start terminal, is that the terminal under the small plastic cap withe the + symbol on it?

 

Yes!
You should see the same voltage as the battery there & also on the starter solenoid terminal.
If you don't, then there's something wrong with the fusible link or the main battery connection at the back.

 

Fixed! The problem was indeed the fusible link. Was an easy fix for $5.00 that I would have never have found without y'all's help. I can't thank y'all enough for the money you saved me, not to mention the money and trouble it would taken me to tow it back 160 miles from home. By the way, is it normal for one these fusible links to go bad? It is a rigged set-up as you can see from the pic. Should I worry about it going bad again? I was very lucky this didn't happen at highway speed in heavy traffic. Could have been tragic. Thanks again!

 

This is two things. For cars with the factory set-up, no it isn't normal for them to go bad. It's really a sort of catastrophic fail safe to protect against the shorting out the battery in the event of a collision or other major problem. The thing isn't supposed to trip (fail open) until hitting like 250A. Right now though, you don't have the factory set up but whatever creative mastery a previous owner did to get the car running. We don't know how much current tripped it, how, or why. Could be one end of it or the cable shorted out to the body through worn thin electrical tape when you hit the bump, or could be an affected high current system on board (or short elsewhere) that tripped it. Power steering maybe? That one goes at 100A.

In short I probably would worry about it going bad again until the car is either restored to a factory configuration back there or you've installed the equivalent in a universal fit setup from Painless or the like. Either way you need to be assured the car is safe, and electrical tape obviously isn't going to cut it.

 

Something is drawing current. When I connect the negative cable to the battery, there is some arcing. Is this a clue to some sort of electrical gremlin somewhere?

 

There's always going to be some, and don't forget the dome light you switched on with the tail gate open to reach the battery. But, you can pull that fuse and measure the current draw between the negative cable and the battery (use the 10A setting first on your multimeter; if you have anything big you'll fry the fuse on the 10ma setting). Anything more than a few milliamps for the snoozing electronics is excessive and you can then start looking further, pulling fuses one by one to narrow down the circuit then component etc...

Might want to pull OBDII codes as well once you sort the creative cabling / fusible link issue...

 

Went over a curb with my back tire and came down pretty hard, battery wasn’t fastened down and broke the cable on the battery fuse module and blew a fuse in the interior cabin, f41. No power that I can see anywhere but on the terminals under the hood and in the hatch after replacing the fuse and the battery cable. All fuses and relays seem fine even the ones under the hood. Tested the fl1-4, hard to reach but tested them while in the housing and beeps in continuity setting. The battery cable safety features doesn’t seem to have discharged, can’t see metal anywhere, and replaced the battery fuse module midi fuse 200A even though it tested fine in continuity setting (replaced it because it was falling apart). Am I missing something? Is there something else I should be checking?