I recently replaced the motor mount adapter on my driver side so I had to move the fuse box out the way. Put everything back together and things seemed fine but while I was working on something else I saw smoke suddenly coming from my engine so I immediately disconnected the battery.

I put the wires almost exactly like the picture below with two wires attached to the fuse box bolt.



When only the wire that goes to the battery is attached things are fine and when only the other wire is attached there was no smoke but obviously the car wouldnt turn on. But when both were attached a pretty decent amount of smoke was coming from the engine bay.

2 questions:
1. What is the second wire that doesnt lead to the battery?
2. And how do I prevent my car from catching fire and exploding?

 

Uhhh, those wires aren't OEM.

 

I know thats not actually my engine bay. its just a picture I found that looks similar to what mine does. When i googled it I found a thread that said there should be two wires attached to the positive post that sticks out the fuse box.

 

one goes to the alternator and the other goes to the battery. check the run from the alt to fusebox because the other one would be "live" regardless. hopefully you didnt fry your fusebox

 

Alright will do thanks. And I don't think I did But fingers crossed.

Any idea what would cause all the smoke?

 

if the wire is pinched or grounding out somewhere thats probably the cause

 

So finished fixing my cv Axle today and when I got around to testing the fusebox issue I ran into the same issue minus the smoking. I checked as best I could for an pinched wires but everything looks fine.

If I even touch the wire that's supposed to go to the alternator to the positive post of the fusebox my wipers go off and my lights quickly flash...


The copper one is the one giving me problems. The small wire is for my HIDs and the other onend goes to my battery. Wtf is going on.

 

maybe its just me but that ring doesnt look stock and it looks like its barely hanging on. Did you route the wire to the alternator?

 

From what I can tell that bunch of wires seem to go to the lights and windshield wiper fluid dispenser... and honestly as hard as I try to remember I definitely don't remember seeing it attached to my fusebox before.

 

maybe thats a ground? but where would it have come from? The stock alternator wire end looks exactly like battery one and you should be able to trace it to the alternator. it would be a single thick wire that isnt going anywhere but to the alternator.

 

Thats what I was thinking. And what is it a ground to? The weird thing the wires attached to it go in two different directions. 2 of the wires inside go to the lights/wiper fluid. The other I couldnt follow because it got too dark.

Maybe its the alternators ground? Maybe whoever owned my car first combined the alternator/battery positive? Idek.

 

the battery pos is stock. you would have a hard time getting that connector and chrimp especially if you were ghetto rigging things

your best bet might be to try finding the wire at the alt and seeing where it goes from there?

 

Yeah Ill try to do that tomorrow morning. If its not a ground and I attach it to a ground screw could anything bad happen?

 

if is hooked up to the headlights i want to say no but if its hooked to the alt then most definitely. So i cant really say unless i knew what it was. you could always get a multi meter and test that connection with the ground wire on the lights and see if there is continuity. If so that would give you a for sure its supposed to be a ground

You said you dont remember it being on the pos post. do you remember where it was? even an idea?

 

So I went back out there this morning and maybe it was the glorious sun but I noticed that there is another ground wire with the same exact connector grounded beneath the coolant tank. So I'm pretty sure its a ground for something.






^^^This is the one under the coolant tank. So my questsion is should I connect the mystery wire to this same screw or attach it underneath the fusebox like:

 

So I attached the connector ton the stub underneath the coolant tank and car wouldn't start. Tried turning on the lights and one side started smoking. Not good. But the wipers worked normally. However, if the mystery wire is not attached to anything the wipers will go off continously.

 

**** idk man all this wires smoking had me pretty worried

 

Yeah I'm almost positive I fried the started or something else. Probably just gonna have to go through it one by one and figure out what I messed up lol.

 

Replaced the starter today. Still only get one click and no start.

 

does anything change if you unplugg the battery and try again after 10 mins or so

 

Is the battery charged? That copper terminal is definitely a ground..

 

well when I switched the started the battery was unplugged for about an hour or so.

Just checked using a multimeter and the battery is reading 12.08V or so. Seems a bit low as most people say it should be around 12.4.

 

Well battery is reading around 12.1V. not exactly fully charged

 

Left battery unplugged then trried again and no change. I did the jumper cable/screwdriver starter test and the started pops out and spins so I think the old started is good.

 

Referring to the 2 oem lugs/wires on the fusebox post: The one wire goes to the battery. The other one goes to the starter, not the alternator. There is another wire that jumps from the starter to the alternator.

The mystery one you posted definitely looks like an oem ground