Does anyone have any ideas on a strange electrical problem?
The 15A fuse that looks after the top half of the radio/cassette (and cig
lighter) blew about a month ago. I replaced the fuse and all was happy for
about three weeks. A week ago it blew again and when replaced blew the
following day. That evening tried another and it blew instantly.
Survived rest of the week with no music and on Saturday took the radio out
but all connections wiring seemed OK. Fine all weekend, then on the motorway
today it went again?
I have got a multimeter - would it be useful to plug it into the fuse socket
and take a reading while driving around??
Any advice would be welcomed.
Andrew H.
Strange electrical problem
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Michael Donovan
Strange electrical problem
Hi Andrew,
just a few ideas on your problem.
1) It could be a faulty radio. It might have something loose inside that's
shorting.
2) The wiring of one of your speaker connections could be shorting, maybe
some insulation had stripped off, causing an intermittent short. Depending
on the type of radio it could either cut itself off if it senses that a
speaker connection is pulling too much current or it could just pop the fuse.
I'd tend to check the radio out on a bench power supply and see what
happens. Then I'd begin to check out the speaker wiring with your
multimeter, see there are no shorts to ground(chasis) This may be difficult
seeing as the problem appears to be intermittent.
I'd check out as you said too, If you can try plugging the meter onto the
outlet of the fuse and see whats happening there too.
Hope the above is some use.
Mike
just a few ideas on your problem.
1) It could be a faulty radio. It might have something loose inside that's
shorting.
2) The wiring of one of your speaker connections could be shorting, maybe
some insulation had stripped off, causing an intermittent short. Depending
on the type of radio it could either cut itself off if it senses that a
speaker connection is pulling too much current or it could just pop the fuse.
I'd tend to check the radio out on a bench power supply and see what
happens. Then I'd begin to check out the speaker wiring with your
multimeter, see there are no shorts to ground(chasis) This may be difficult
seeing as the problem appears to be intermittent.
I'd check out as you said too, If you can try plugging the meter onto the
outlet of the fuse and see whats happening there too.
Hope the above is some use.
Mike
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Mark Roberts
Strange electrical problem
Well, all you could measure would be current, surely? And for thatI have got a multimeter - would it be useful to plug it into the fuse
socket and take a reading while driving around??
you would need a grunty ammeter, not a DSE special. And as soon as
the fault occurred, it would pop its fuse as well. So I don't know
what you would learn...
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Michael Donovan
Strange electrical problem
Yes I agree, but I wasn't thinking about using the meter to monitor the
current, just as a final resort if no fault could be found with the radio,
or any of the speaker wiring etc, then it could be used to monitor the
voltage at the fuse just to ensure that it is not getting going high for
whatever reason...though thinking about it , if the volts here were to be
drifting high then the regulator/rectifier (or whatever these modern cars
use as an alternative) could be at fault.
Did the fuse only blow at high volume??
What fuse is in line and how many watts does the radio put out when cranked
up?
It could be a lot of things, I reckon your best bet if you can, would be to
get an old radio, any old thing,and put it in place of whatever you use now,
if the fuse blowing stops for a time, then the fault probably lies with the
radio.
Mike
current, just as a final resort if no fault could be found with the radio,
or any of the speaker wiring etc, then it could be used to monitor the
voltage at the fuse just to ensure that it is not getting going high for
whatever reason...though thinking about it , if the volts here were to be
drifting high then the regulator/rectifier (or whatever these modern cars
use as an alternative) could be at fault.
Did the fuse only blow at high volume??
What fuse is in line and how many watts does the radio put out when cranked
up?
It could be a lot of things, I reckon your best bet if you can, would be to
get an old radio, any old thing,and put it in place of whatever you use now,
if the fuse blowing stops for a time, then the fault probably lies with the
radio.
Mike
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